EDUCATION 

ACCORDING    TO   SOME 
MODERN     MASTERS 


CHARLES  FRANKLIN  THWING 


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PRESIDENT  THWING'S 
BOOKS  ON  COLLEGE  SUBJECTS: 

American  Colleges:  Their  Students  and  Work. 

Within  College  Walls. 

The  College  Woman. 

The  American  College  in  American  Life. 

College  Administration. 

If  I  Were  a  College  Student. 

The  Choice  of  a  College. 

A  Liberal  Education  and  a  Liberal  Faith. 

College  Training  and  the  Business  Man. 

A  History  of  Higher  Education  in  America. 

Education  in  the  Far  East. 

History  of  Education  in  the  United  States  Since 
the  Civil  War. 

Universities  of  the  World. 

Letters  from  a  Father  to  His  Son  Entering  Col- 
lege. 

Letters  from  a  Father  to  His  Daughter  Entering 
College. 

The  Co-Ordinate  System  in  the  Higher  Educa- 
tion. 

The  American  College:  What  It  Is  and  What  It 
May  Become. 

Education  According  to  Some  Modem  Masters. 


EDUCATION 

ACCORDING    TO    SOME 
MODERN    MASTERS 


BY 
CHARLES    FRANKLIN    THWING 

FRE8IDKMT  OP  WESTERN  BE8EBVE  CNTVEBSITT 
AND  ADELBEBT  COLLEGE 


THE  PLATT  &  PECK  CO. 


Copyright,  1916,  by 
THE  PLATT  &  PECK  CO. 


LA 

PREFATORY  NOTE 

EDUCATION  is  in  peril  of  losing  its  human 
touch.  Important  as  technical  means,  meth- 
ods and  conditions  are,  there  is  a  belief,  and  a  dan- 
ger, too,  that  these  elements  may  take  to  themselves 
an  importance  not  fundamentally  belonging  to 
them.  In  the  desire  to  emphasize  the  large  human 
relations,  I  have  made  these  interpretations  of  the 
educational  masters  who,  first  and  last,  are  human- 
ists. Being  great  humanists,  they  have  tried  to  see 
education,  as  they  have  tried  to  see  other  great 
hmnan  forces,  in  its  relations.  In  my  turn,  I  have 
simply  tried  to  interpret  and  properly  to  relate 
their  utterances. 

It  is  my  present  hope  to  make  a  similar  inter- 
pretation of  the  Greek  and  Latin  masters  and  of 
the  medieval.  For,  each  age  indeed  should  have  a 
voice,  moving  and  quickening  for  every  other  age 
of  the  race  and  of  the  races  of  man. 

C.  F.  T. 

Western  Reserve  University, 

Cleveland. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPm  FAOE 

I.    Emerson 1 

II.    Carlyle 38 

III.  RusKiN 74 

IV.  John  Stuart  Mill 131 

V.    Gladstone 179 

VI.    Matthew  Arnold 196 

VII.    John  Henry  Newman 221 

VIII.     Goethe 251 

IX.    Summary  and  Conclusion 279 

Index 293 


EDUCATION  ACCORDING  TO 
SOME  MODERN   MASTERS 


EDUCATION   ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON 

SCIENCE,  knowledge,  the  scholar,  the  intellect, 
as  well  as  education,  are  the  great  terms  under 
which  Emerson  presents  his  thoughts  regarding 
our  central  subject.  Little  does  it  signify  which  of 
the  quintette  of  words  is  used.  For,  science  and 
knowledge  are  the  materials  of  which  education 
makes  avail,  and  by  the  use  of  which  the  intellect 
creates  the  scholar.  The  scholar  represents  the 
force  in  education  who,  in  turn,  is  himself  the  prod- 
uct of  education.  In  this  personality  called  the 
scholar,  the  intellect  is  the  chief  part,  guiding,  in- 
spiring, by  its  own  might  enlarging  itself  and  aU 
that  it  approaches.  Education,  in  turn,  commands 
science  and  all  knowledge  as  its  tool  and  content, 
disciplining  the  intellect,  creating  the  scholar.  Of 
all  the  words  of  the  quintette  education  is  the  term 
most  germinal,  fundamental  and  comprehensive. 

In  Emerson's  presentation  of  this  great  imit 

1 


2  EDUCATION 

composed  of  diverse  elements,  education  is  not 
found  as  an  orderly  process.  It  is  not  seen  as  an 
art,  much  less  as  a  science.  Its  nature  is  inter- 
preted with  aptness,  grandeur  and  inspiring  im- 
pressiveness,  but  is  not  definitely  articulated.  Its 
purposes,  and  in  turn  its  effects,  are  indicated  with 
fullness,  diversity  and  weight,  not  at  all  with 
scholarly  orderliness.  Its  methods  are  outlined 
and  its  forces  made  known,  but  not  in  sequence. 
Its  conditions  and  limitations  are  drawn  up  with 
philosophical  comprehensiveness,  breadth,  depth 
and  height,  but  the  presentation  lacks  precision. 

We  may  thank  God  that  the  educational  gospel 
of  Emerson  is  as  it  is,  and  that  it  is  not  scholastic. 
It  is  life,  and  life,  although  lived  under  recognized 
principles,  is  not  subject  to  prescription.  Emer- 
son's idea  of  education  calls  up  picturesque  visions 
of  the  Concord  meadows.  His  thought  wanders 
on  quietly  like  the  Concord  River,  and  its  reflection 
of  forest  and  field,  of  horizon  and  zenith,  suggests 
the  Concord  landscapes. 

Emerson's  own  education  gives  a  prophetic  inti- 
mation of  the  variety  of  his  interpretation  of  the 
forms  and  forces  of  education.  The  regular  course 
of  Harvard  College,  which  he  entered  in  1817,  did 
not  command  his  attention,  and  he  left,  after  pur- 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  3 

suing  it  for  four  years,  feeling,  in  the  words  of 
James  Elliot  Cabot,  his  biographer, 

that  the  college  had  done  little  for  him.  He  found  there  but 
little  nutriment  suited  to  his  appetite,  and  strayed  off,  though 
with  some  misgivings,  to  other  pastures.  In  one  of  his  jour- 
nals long  afterwards,  he  speaks  of  "the  instinct  which  leads 
the  youth  who  has  no  faculty  for  mathematics,  and  weeps  over 
the  impossible  Analytical  Geometry,  to  console  his  defeats  with 
Chaucer  and  Montaigne,  with  Plutarch  and  Plato  at  night." 
.  .  .  "The  boy  at  college  apologizes  for  not  learning  the  tutor's 
tasks,  and  tries  to  learn  them ;  but  stronger  nature  gives  him 
Otway  and  Massinger  to  read,  or  betrays  him  into  a  stroll  to 
Mount  Auburn,  in  study  hours.  The  poor  boy,  instead  of 
thanking  the  gods  and  slighting  the  mathematical  tutor,  ducks 
before  the  functionary,  and  poisons  his  fine  pleasures  by  a 
perpetual  penance." 

In  his  own  way  he  was  industrious;  feeling  va^ely  that, 
for  him,  power  of  expression  was  more  important  than  philo- 
logical or  scientific  training. 

Of  his  college  standing  Mr.  Cabot  says : 

The  rest  of  the  course  (except  mathematics)  he  passed 
through  without  discredit  though  without  distinction,  and 
came  out  somewhat  above  the  middle  of  his  class  in  college 
rank. 

And  he  adds : 

It  may  be  doubted  whether  under  any  system  he  would 
have  been  a  student  of  books.    It  was  not  in  his  nature;  he 


4  EDUCATION 

could  never,  he  said  in  after  years,  deal  with  other  people's 
facts  and  he  never  made  the  attempt.^ 

The  subject  to  be  educated,  according  to  Emer- 
son, is  man,  and  this  man  is  a  youth.  Youth  in  turn 
is  in  part  a  temporary  thing,  and  is  only  in  part  to 
be  interpreted  in  terms  of  manhood,  of  interest,  of 
responsiveness,  of  contagious  and  absorbing  en- 
thusiasms and  of  immortal  hilarity. 

Education,  according  to  Emerson,  is  to  be  under- 
stood, not  through  formal  definition,  but  through 
consideration  of  its  purposes  and  effects,  its  meth- 
ods, forces,  conditions  and  values.  Without  giving 
a  formal  definition  himself,  he  adopts  the  great 
definition  of  John  Milton.  He  holds  that  in  all 
English  literature  there  is  no  ^'more  noble  outline 
of  a  wise  external  education  than  that  which  he 
[Milton]  drew  up,  at  the  age  of  thirty-six,  in  his 
Letter  to  Samuel  Hartlib."  ^ 

The  college,  in  giving  education,  deals  at  once 
with  truth  and  personality.  It  has  **to  teach  you 
geometry,  or  the  lovely  laws  of  space  and  figure; 
chemistry,  botany,  zoology,  the  streaming  of 
thought  into  form,  and  the  precipitation  of  atoms 

* "  A  Memoir  of  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson, ' '  James  Elliot  Cabot,  Hough- 
ton, Mifflin  and  Co.,  Vol.  I,  pp.  56,  57. 

*" Milton,"  Complete  Works  of  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson,  Houghton, 
MiflBin  and  Co.,  Centenary  Edition,  Vol.  XII.,  p.  256. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  5 

which  Nature  is.*'*  But  education  is  also  per- 
sonal.   It  is 

the  happy  meeting  of  the  young  soul,  filled  Mrith  the  desire, 
with  the  living  teacher  who  has  already  made  the  passage 
from  the  centre  forth,  step  by 'step,  along  the  intellectual  roads 
to  the  theory  and  practice  of  special  science.  Now  if  there 
be  genius  in  the  scholar,  that  is,  a  delicate  sensibility  to  the 
laws  of  the  world,  and  the  power  to  express  them  again  in 
some  new  form,  he  is  made  to  find  his  own  way.  He  will 
greet  joyfully  the  wise  teacher,  but  colleges  and  teachers  are 
no  wise  essential  to  him;  he  will  find  teachers  everywhere.* 

The  lower  purpose  of  education  is  the  object  of 
ridicule  by  Mr.  Emerson.  The  ground  is  alto- 
gether too  common  of  which  he  makes  fun.  It  is 
said  that 

the  people  have  the  power,  and  if  they  are  not  instructed  to 
sympathize  with  the  intelligent,  reading,  trading  and  gov- 
erning class;  inspired  with  a  taste  for  the  same  competitions 
and  prizes,  they  will  upset  the  fair  pageant  of  Judicature,  and 
perhaps  lay  a  hand  on  the  sacred  muniments  of  wealth  itself, 
and  new  distribute  the  land.' 

And  a  still  lower  purpose  may  prevail.    One 

will  hear  every  day  the  maxims  of  a  low  prudence.  You  will 
hear  that  the  first  duty  is  to  get  land  and  money,  place  and 

•"The  Celebration  of  Intellect,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Ibid.,  p.  127. 

*Ib%d.,  p.  128. 

•  *  *  The  Coniervative, ' '  Complete  Works,  etc.,  VoL  I.,  p.  320. 


6  EDUCATION 

nanie.  * '  What  is  this  Truth  you  seek  ?  what  is  this  Beauty  ? ' ' 
men  will  ask,  with  derision.  If  nevertheless  God  have  called 
any  of  you  to  explore  truth  and  beauty,  be  bold,  be  firm,  be 
true.  When  you  shall  say,  "As  others  do,  so  will  I:  I  re- 
nounce, I  am  sorry  for  it,  my  early  visions;  I  must  eat  the 
good  of  the  land  and  let  learning  and  romantic  expectations 
go,  until  a  more  convenient  season;" — then  dies  the  man  in 
you ;  then  once  more  perish  the  buds  of  art,  and  poetry,  and 
science,  as  they  have  died  already  in  a  thousand  thousand 
men.  The  hour  of  that  choice  is  the  crisis  of  your  history, 
and  see  that  you  hold  yourself  fast  by  the  intellect.  It  is 
this  domineering  temper  of  the  sensual  world  that  creates 
the  extreme  need  of  the  priests  of  science ;  and  it  is  the  office 
and  right  of  the  intellect  to  make  and  not  take  its  estimate.' 

No  such  reasoning  has  value  with  this  philoso- 
pher who  is  at  once  transcendental  and  experi- 
mental. The  education  which  a  man  receives  is  re- 
creation of  the  man,  or  at  least  a  confirmation  of 
the  original  creation  in  which  he  was  made. 

Humanly  speaking,  the  school,  the  college,  society,  make  the 
difference  between  men.  All  the  fairy  tales  of  Aladdin  or  the 
invisible  Gyges  or  the  talisman  that  opens  Kings'  palaces  or 
the  enchanted  halls  underground  or  in  the  sea,  are  only  fic- 
tions to  indicate  the  one  miracle  of  intellectual  enlargement. 
When  a  man  stupid  becomes  a  man  inspired,  when  one  and 
the  same  man  passes  out  of  the  torpid  into  the  perceiving 
state,  leaves  the  din  of  trifles,  the  stupor  of  the  senses,  to 
enter  into  the  quasi-omniscience  of  high  thought, — ^up  and 

'"Literary  Ethics,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Ibid.,  p.  185. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  7 

down,  around,  all  limits  disappear.    No  horizon  shuts  down. 
He  sees  things  in  their  causes,  all  facts  in  their  connection.^ 

The  scholar,  as  I  have  intimated,  is  the  force  in 
education  and  also  its  fruit.  His  function  is  a 
great  and  precious  one. 

The  scholar,  when  he  comes,  will  be  known  by  an  energy 
that  will  animate  all  who  see  him.  The  labor  of  ambition  and 
avarice  will  appear  fumbling  beside  his.  In  the  right  hands, 
literature  is  not  resorted  to  as  a  consolation,  and  by  the 
broken  and  decayed,  but  as  a  decalogue.  In  this  country 
we  are  fond  of  results  and  of  short  ways  to  them ;  and  most 
in  this  department.  In  our  experiences,  learning  is  not 
learned,  nor  is  genius  wise.  The  name  of  the  Scholar  is 
taken  in  vain.  We  who  should  be  the  channel  of  that  un- 
weariable  Power  which  never  sleeps,  must  give  our  diligence 
no  holidays.  Other  men  are  planting  and  building,  baking 
and  tanning,  running  and  sailing,  heaving  and  carrying,  each 
that  he  may  peacefully  execute  the  fine  function  by  which 
they  all  are  helped.  Shall  he  play,  whilst  their  eyes  follow 
him  from  far  with  reverence,  attributing  to  him  the  delving 
in  great  fields  of  thought,  and  conversing  with  supernatural 
allies?  If  he  is  not  kindling  his  torch  or  collecting  oil,  he 
will  fear  to  go  by  a  workshop;  he  will  not  dare  to  hear  the 
music  of  a  saw  or  plane ;  the  steam-engine  will  reprimand,  the 
steam-pipe  will  hiss  at  him;  he  cannot  look  a  blacksmith  in 
the  eye;  in  the  field  he  will  be  shamed  by  mowers  and  reapers. 
The  speculative  man,  the  scholar,  is  the  right  hero.  He  is 
brave,  because  he  sees  the  omnipotence  of  that  which  in- 
spires him.    Is  there  only  one  courage  and  one  warfare?    I 

*"EducaUon,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  VoL  X.,  p.  126. 


8  EDUCATION 

cannot  manage  sword  and  rifle;  can  I  not  therefore  be 
brave?  I  thought  there  were  as  many  courages  as  men.  Is 
an  armed  man  the  only  hero?  Is  a  man  only  the  breech  of 
a  gun  or  the  haft  or  a  bowie-knife  ?  Men  of  thought  fail  in 
fighting  down  malignity,  because  they  wear  other  armor  than 
their  own.  Let  them  decline  henceforward  foreign  methods 
and  foreign  courages.  Let  them  do  that  which  they  can  do. 
Let  them  fight  by  their  strength,  not  by  their  weakness.  It 
seems  to  me  that  the  thoughtful  man  needs  no  armor  but 
this — concentration.* 

The  scholar  also  has  a  special  function  in  minis- 
tering to  the  joy  of  life.    Emerson  says : 

I  think  the  peculiar  office  of  scholars  in  a  careful  and 
gloomy  generation  is  to  be  (as  the  poets  were  called  in  the 
Middle  Ages)  Professors  of  the  Joyous  Science,  detectors  and 
delineators  of  occult  symmetries  and  unpublished  beauties; 
heralds  of  civility,  nobility,  learning  and  wisdom;  affirmers 
of  the  one  law,  yet  as  those  who  should  affirm  it  in  music 
and  dancing;  expressors  themselves  of  that  firm  and  cheer- 
ful temper,  infinitely  removed  from  sadness,  which  reigns 
through  the  kingdoms  of  chemistry,  vegetation  and  animal 
life.  Every  natural  power  exhilarates ;  a  true  talent  delights 
the  possessor  first.  A  celebrated  musician  was  wont  to  say, 
that  men  knew  not  how  much  more  he  delighted  himself  with 
his  playing  than  he  did  others ;  for  if  they  knew,  his  hearers 
would  rather  demand  of  him  than  give  him  a  reward.  The 
scholar  is  here  to  fill  others  with  love  and  courage  by  con- 
firming their  trust  in  the  love  and  wisdom  which  are  at  the 
heart  of  all  things;  to  affirm  noble  sentiments;  to  hear  them 

•"The  Scholar,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Ibid.,  pp.  273-74. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  9 

wherever  spoken,  out  of  the  deeps  of  ages,  out  of  the  obscuri- 
ties of  barbarous  life,  and  to  republish  them : — to  untune  no- 
body, but  to  draw  all  men  after  the  truth,  and  to  keep  men 
spiritual  and  sweet." 

In  the  broadest  way,  the  scholar,  at  once  the 
subject  and  the  force  of  education, 

is  here  to  be  the  beholder  of  the  real ;  self-centred  amidst  the 
superficial ;  here  to  revere  the  dominion  of  a  serene  necessity 
and  be  its  pupil  and  apprentice  by  tracing  everything  home 
to  a  cause;  here  to  be  sobered,  not  by  the  cares  of  life,  as 
men  say,  no,  but  by  the  depth  of  his  draughts  of  the  cup  of 
immortaJity.*" 

The  scholar  is  both  the  thinker  and  the  expositor. 
He  represents  true  wisdom.  He  reveals,  and  he  is 
able  to  reveal,  because  he  is  a  learner.  Being  a 
thinker  and  revealer,  he  is  a  master.  He  embodies 
the  Napoleonic  command.  Bearing  the  yoke  in  his 
youth,  enduring  toil  as  a  good  soldier,  he  is  able 
through  obedience  to  become  a  first-rate  com- 
mander. He  unites  in  himself  the  two  poles  of 
reason  and  common  sense.  Lacking  reason,  his 
philosophy  is  utilitarian ;  lacking  common  sense,  it 
becomes  too  vague  for  life 's  uses. 

Happy  is  the  lot  of  the  scholar  in  this  new  world. 

*Ibid.,  p.  262. 
"Jfttd.,  p.  264. 


10  EDUCATION 

In  an  address  given  at  Dartmouth  CoUege  in  the 
year  1838,  Mr.  Emerson  said : 

I  have  reached  the  middle  age  of  man ;  yet  I  believe  I  am 
not  less  glad  or  sanguine  at  the  meeting  of  scholars,  than 
when,  a  boy,  I  first  saw  the  graduates  of  my  own  College 
assembled  at  their  anniversary.  Neither  years  nor  books  have 
yet  availed  to  extirpate  a  prejudice  then  rooted  in  me,  that 
a  scholar  is  the  favorite  of  Heaven  and  earth,  the  excellency 
of  his  country,  the  happiest  of  men.  His  duties  lead  him 
directly  into  the  holy  ground  where  other  men's  aspirations 
only  point.  His  successes  are  occasions  of  the  purest  joy 
to  all  men.  Eyes  is  he  to  the  blind;  feet  is  he  to  the  lame. 
His  failures,  if  he  is  worthy,  are  inlets  to  higher  advantages. 
And  because  the  scholar  by  every  thought  he  thinks  extends 
his  dominion  into  the  general  mind  of  men,  he  is  not  one, 
but  many.  The  few  scholars  in  each  country,  whose  genius 
I  know,  seem  to  me  not  individuals,  but  societies;  and  when 
events  occur  of  great  import,  I  count  over  these  representa- 
tives of  opinion,  whom  they  will  affect,  as  if  I  were  counting 
nations.  And  even  if  his  results  were  incommunicable;  if 
they  abode  in  his  own  spirit;  the  intellect  hath  somewhat  so 
sacred  in  its  possessions  that  the  fact  of  his  existence  and 
pursuits  would  be  a  happy  omen.^^ 

Although  happy,  the  scholar  in  America  is  not 
to  sit  down  in  listless  idleness. 

Here  you  are  set  down,  scholars  and  idealists,  as  in  a  bar- 
barous age;  amidst  insanity,  to  calm  and  guide  it;  amidst 
fools  and  blind,  to  see  the  right  done;  among  violent  pro- 

"" Literary  Ethics,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  I.,  p.  155. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  11 

prietors,  to  check  self-interest,  stone-blind  and  stone-deaf,  by 
considerations  of  humanity  to  the  workman  and  to  his  child; 
amongst  angry  politicians  swelling  with  self-esteem,  pledged 
to  parties,  pledged  to  clients,  you  are  to  make  valid  the  large 
considerations  of  equity  and  good  sense;  under  bad  govern- 
ments to  force  on  them,  by  your  persistence,  good  laws. 
Around  that  immovable  persistency  of  yours,  statesmen,  leg- 
islatures, must  revolve,  denying  you,  but  not  less  forced  to 
obey." 

In  this  educational  process,  all  forces,  even  the 
whole  world  itself,  educates.  The  teachers  are 
found  in  earth,  air,  sky  and  sea,  as  well  as  in 
humanity  itself. 

We  have  many  teachers;  we  are  in  this  world  for  culture, 
to  be  instructed  in  realities,  in  the  laws  of  moral  and  intelli- 
gent nature ;  and  our  education  is  not  conducted  by  toys  and 
luxuries,  but  by  austere  and  ru^ed  masters,  by  poverty,  soli- 
tude, passions.  War,  Slavery ;  to  know  that  Paradise  is  under 
the  shadow  of  swords;  that  divine  sentiments  which  are  al- 
ways soliciting  us  are  breathed  into  us  from  on  high,  and 
are  an  offset  to  a  Universe  of  suffering  and  crime ;  that  self- 
reliance,  the  height  and  perfection  of  man,  is  reliance  on 
God."  To  breathe,  to  sleep,  is  wonderful.  But  never  to 
know  the  Cause,  the  Giver,  and  infer  his  character  and  will ! 
Of  what  import  this  vacant  sky,  these  puffing  elements,  these 
insignificant  lives  full  of  selfish  loves  and  quarrels  and  ennui  ? 
Everything  is   prospective,   and   man   is  to  live   hereafter. 

""Progress  of  Culture,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  VoL  VIII.,  p.  230. 
""The  Fugitive  Slave  Law,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  XI.,  p.  236. 


12  EDUCATION 

That  the  world  is  for  his  education  is  the  only  sane  solution 
of  the  enigma.^* 

The  force,  however,  that  does  really  educate  is 
the  teacher,  the  man  teaching.  The  highest  char- 
acter makes  the  most  worthy  instructor.  Person- 
ality is  the  chief  value.  The  communication  of 
character  is  more  than  the  communication  of 
formal  truth.  In  many  places  and  under  diverse 
forms  does  Mr.  Emerson  inculcate  this  great  prin- 
ciple. 

•The  man  may  teach  by  doing,  and  not  otherwise.  If  he 
can  communicate  himself  he  can  teach,  but  not  by  words. 
He  teaches  who  gives,  and  he  learns  who  receives.  There 
is  no  teaching  until  the  pupil  is  brought  into  the  same  state 
or  principle  in  which  you  are;  a  transfusion  takes  place; 
he  is  you  and  you  are  he;  then  is  a  teaching,  and  by  no  un- 
friendly chance  or  bad  company  can  he  ever  quite  lose  the 
benefit.  But  your  propositions  run  out  of  one  ear  as  they 
ran  in  at  the  other.  We  see  it  advertised  that  Mr.  Grand 
will  deliver  an  oration  on  the  Fourth  of  July,  and  Mr.  Hand 
before  the  Mechanics'  Association,  and  we  do  not  go  thither, 
because  we  know  that  these  gentlemen  will  not  communicate 
their  own  character  and  experience  to  the  company.  If  we 
had  reason  to  expect  such  a  confidence  we  should  go  through 
all  inconvenience  and  opposition.  The  sick  would  be  car- 
ried in  litters.    But  a  public  oration  is  an  escapade,  a  non- 

"" Immortality,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  VIII.,  p.  334. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  13 

commita],  an  apology,  a  gag,  and  not  a  communication,  not 
a  speech,  not  a  man." 

The  man  who  thus  teaches  is  a  scholar,  and  the 
scholar  is  to  have  resources.  In  his  first  great  ora- 
tion, Emerson  interprets  with  detail  the  resources 
of  the  American  scholar,  which  consist,  he  says,  of 
nature,  of  the  past  and  of  action.  These  resources 
are  primarily  resources  of  the  intellect.  As  he 
says,  in  the  college  address  of  1838, 

The  resources  of  the  scholar  are  proportioned  to  his  con- 
fidence in  the  attributes  of  the  Intellect.  The  resources  of 
the  scholar  are  coextensive  with  nature  and  truth,  yet  can 
never  be  his  unless  claimed  by  him  with  an  equal  greatness 
of  mind.  He  cannot  know  them  until  he  has  beheld  with 
awe  the  infinitude  and  impersonality  of  the  intellectual  power. 
When  he  has  seen  that  it  is  not  his,  nor  any  man's,  but  that 
it  is  the  soul  which  made  the  world,  and  that  it  is  all  acces- 
sible to  him,  he  will  know  that  he,  as  its  minister,  may  right- 
fully hold  all  things  subordinate  and  answerable  to  it.  A 
divine  pilgrim  in  nature,  all  things  attend  his  steps.  Over 
him  stream  the  flying  constellations;  over  him  streams  Time, 
as  they,  scarcely  divided  into  months  and  years.  He  inhales 
the  year  as  a  vapor:  its  fragrant  midsummer  breath,  its 
sparkling  January  heaven.  And  so  pass  into  his  mind,  in 
bright  transfiguration,  the  grand  events  of  history,  to  take 
a  new  order  and  scale  from  him.  He  is  the  world;  and  the 
epochs  and  heroes  of  chronology  are  pictorial  images,  in 
which  his  thoughts  are  told.  There  is  no  event  but  sprung 
" ' '  Spiritual  Laws, ' '  Complete  Works,  etc..  Vol.  II.,  p.  152. 


14  EDIJCATION 

somewhere  from  the  soul  of  man;  and  therefore  there  is 
none  but  the  soul  of  man  can  interpret.*" 

These  resources  increase,  too,  with  the  growth  of 
the  intellect.  The  scholar's  treasures  are  not  to  be 
slight.  A  larger  receptiveness  stands  for  increas-  ■ 
ing  power.  Its  development  is  a  history  of  alter- 
nating expansions  and  concentrations.  Such 
growth  means  the  augmentation  of  the  power  of 
the  teacher  and  of  education. 

But  it  is  ever  to  be  remembered  that  the  teacher 
is  an  individual,  a  person.  The  teacher  is  to  be 
his  own  individual  self.  Imitation  and  counterfeit 
are  weaknesses.    He  says : 

I  advise  teachers  to  cherish  mother-wit.  I  assume  that 
you  will  keep  the  grammar,  reading,  writing  and  arithmetic 
in  order;  't  is  easy  and  of  course  you  will.  But  smuggle  in 
a  little  contraband  wit,  fancy,  imagination,  thought.  If  you 
have  a  taste  which  you  have  suppressed  because  it  is  not 
shared  by  those  about  you,  tell  them  that.  Set  this  law  up, 
whatever  becomes  of  the  rules  of  the  school:  they  must  not 
whisper,  much  less  talk;  but  if  one  of  the  young  people  says 
a  wise  thing,  greet  it,  and  let  all  the  children  clap  their  hands. 
They  shall  have  no  book  but  school-books  in  the  room;  but 
if  one  has  brought  in  a  Plutarch  or  Shakspeare  or  Don  Quixote 
or  Goldsmith  or  any  other  good  book,  and  understands  what 
he  reads,  put  him  at  once  at  the  head  of  the  class.  Nobody 
shall  be  disorderly,  or  leave  his  desk  without  permission,  but 
""Literary  Ethics,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  I.,  p.  158. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  15 

if  a  boy  runs  from  his  bench,  or  a  girl,  because  the  fire  falls, 
or  to  check  some  injury  that  a  little  dastard  is  inflicting  be- 
hind his  desk  on  some  helpless  sufferer,  take  away  the  medal 
from  the  head  of  the  class  and  give  it  on  the  instant  to  the 
brave  rescuer.  If  a  child  happens  to  show  that  he  knows  any 
fact  about  astronomy,  or  plants,  or  birds,  or  rocks,  or  his- 
tory, that  interests  him  and  you,  hush  all  the  classes  and 
encourage  him  to  tell  it  so  that  all  may  hear.*^ 

But  this  individuality  on  the  part  of  the  teacher 
is  never  to  overcome  the  individuality  on  the  part 
of  the  student.  To  respect  that  student,  his  per- 
sonality, even  his  idiosyncrasies,  is  a  primary  pur- 
pose. 

Let  us  wait  and  see  what  is  this  new  creation,  of  what 
new  organ  the  great  Spirit  had  need  when  it  incarnated 
this  new  Will.  A  new  Adam  in  the  garden,  he  is  to  name 
all  the  beasts  in  the  field,  all  the  gods  in  the  sky.  And 
jealous  provision  seems  to  have  been  made  in  his  constitu- 
tion that  you  shall  not  invade  and  contaminate  him  with 
the  worn  weeds  of  your  language  and  opinions.  The  charm 
of  life  is  this  variety  of  genius,  these  contrasts  and  flavors 
by  which  Heaven  has  modulated  the  identity  of  truth,  and 
there  is  a  perpetual  hankering  to  violate  this  individuality, 
to  warp  his  ways  of  thinking  and  behavior  to  resemble  or 
reflect  your  thinking  and  behavior.  A  low  self-love  in  the 
parent  desires  that  his  child  should  repeat  his  character  and 
fortune;  an  expectation  which  the  child,  if  justice  is  done 
him,  will  nobly  disappoint.    By  working  on  the  theory  that 

""Education,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  VoL  X.,  p.  157. 


16  EDUCATION 

this  resemblance  exists,  we  shall  do  what  in  us  lies  to  defeat 
his  proper  promise  and  produce  the  ordinary  and  mediocre.  I 
suffer  whenever  I  see  that  common  sight  of  a  parent  or  senior 
imposing  his  opinion  and  way  of  thinking  and  being  on  a 
young  soul  to  which  they  are  totally  unfit.  Can  not  we  let 
people  be  themselves,  and  enjoy  life  in  their  own  way  ?  You 
are  trying  to  make  that  man  another  you.    One's  enough. 

Or  we  sacrifice  the  genius  of  the  pupil,  the  unknown  pos- 
sibilities of  his  nature,  to  a  neat  and  safe  uniformity,  as 
the  Turks  whitewash  the  costly  mosaics  of  ancient  art  which 
the  Greeks  left  on  their  temple  walls.  Rather  let  us  have 
men  whose  manhood  is  only  the  continuation  of  their  boy- 
hood, natural  characters  still;  such  are  able  and  fertile  for 
heroic  action;  and  not  that  sad  spectacle  with  which  we  are 
too  familiar,  educated  eyes  in  uneducated  bodies.^* 

In  further  interpretation,  Mr.  Emerson  says,  in 
reference  to  this  supreme  respect  for  the  student : 

It  is  not  for  you  to  choose  what  he  shall  know,  what  he 
shall  do.  It  is  chosen  and  foreordained,  and  he  only  holds 
the  key  to  his  own  secret.  By  your  tampering  and  thwarting 
and  too  much  governing  he  may  be  hindered  from  his  end 
and  kept  out  of  his  own.  Respect  the  child.  Wait  and  see  the 
new  product  of  Nature.  Nature  loves  analogies,  but  not  repe- 
titions. Respect  the  child.  Be  not  too  much  his  parent.  Tres- 
pass not  on  his  solitude.^® 

In  this  whole  educational  process,  education  is 
not  simply  of  the  inferior  by  the  superior,  but  of 

"7&«2.,  p.  137. 
"/6id.,  p.  143. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  17 

the  equal  by  the  equal.  Boys  educate  boys.  The 
education  of  the  playing-fields  may  be  quite  as  good 
as  that  of  the  classroom. 

This  immanliness  is  so  common  a  result  of  our  half-educa- 
tion,— teaching  a  youth  Latin  and  metaphysics  and  history, 
and  neglecting  to  give  him  the  rough  training  of  a  boy, — 
allowing  him  to  skulk  from  the  games  of  ball  and  skates  and 
coasting  down  the  hills  on  his  sled,  and  whatever  else  would 
lead  him  and  keep  him  on  even  terms  with  boys,  so  that  he 
can  meet  them  as  an  equal,  and  lead  in  his  turn, — that  I 
wish  his  guardians  to  consider  that  they  are  thus  preparing 
him  to  play  a  contemptible  part  when  he  is  full-grown.  In 
England  they  send  the  most  delicate  and  protected  child 
from  his  luxurious  home  to  learn  to  rough  it  with  boys  in 
the  public  schools.  A  few  bruises  and  scratches  will  do  him 
no  harm  if  he  has  thereby  learned  not  to  be  afraid.  It  is 
this  wise  mixture  of  good  drill  in  Latin  grammar  with  good 
drill  in  cricket,  boating  and  wrestling,  that  is  the  boast  of 
English  education,  and  of  high  importance  to  the  matter  in 
hand.'^"  .  .  .  You  send  your  child  to  the  schoolmaster,  but  't  is 
the  schoolboys  who  educate  him.  You  send  him  to  the 
Latin  class,  but  much  of  his  tuition  comes,  on  his  way  to 
school,  from  the  shop-windows.  You  like  the  strict  rules  and 
the  long  terms;  and  he  finds  his  best  leading  in  a  by-way 
of  his  own,  and  refuses  any  companions  but  of  his  own  choos- 
ing. He  hates  the  grammar  and  Gradus,  and  loves  guns, 
fishing-rods,  horses  and  boats.  Well,  the  boy  is  right,  and  you 
are  not  fit  to  direct  his  bringing-up  if  your  theory  leaves 
out  his  gymnastic  training.  Archery,  cricket,  gun  and  fish- 
ing-rod, horse  and  boat,  are  all  educators,  liberalizers ;  and  so 
*•" Eloquence,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  VIII., 4).  128. 


18  EDUCATION 

are  dancing,  dress  and  the  street  talk ;  and  provided  only  the 
boy  has  resources,  and  is  of  a  noble  and  ingenuous  strain, 
these  will  not  serve  him  less  than  the  books.^^ 

But  among  the  forces  and  causes  of  education 
one  force  and  cause  demands  special  recognition. 
It  is  religion.  Religion,  a  mighty  force  itself,  is  to 
be  intellectual,  and,  being  intellectual,  it  is  pri- 
marily concerned  with  education. 

The  religion  which  is  to  guide  and  fulfil  the  present  and 
coming  ages,  whatever  else  it  be,  must  be  intellectual.  The 
scientific  mind  must  have  a  faith  which  is  science.  "There 
are  two  things,"  said  Mahomet,  "which  I  abhor,  the  learned 
in  his  infidelities,  and  the  fool  in  his  devotions."  Our  times 
are  impatient  of  both,  and  specially  of  the  last.  Let  us 
have  nothing  now  which  is  not  its  own  evidence.  There  is 
surely  enough  for  the  heart  and  imagination  in  the  religion 
itself.  Let  us  not  be  pestered  with  assertions  and  half-truths, 
with  emotion  and  snuffle.^^ 

The  value  of  religion  as  an  educator  is  reflected 
in  the  history  of  Concord  itself.  In  an  address 
given  at  the  opening  of  the  Concord  Public  Li- 
brary, Emerson  said : 

A  deep  religious  sentiment  is,  in  all  times,  an  inspirer  of 
the  intellect,  and  that  was  not  wanting  here.    The  town  was 

""The  Conduct  of  Life:  Culture,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  VI., 
p.  142. 

" ' '  The  Conduct  of  Life :  Worship, ' '  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Ibid.,  p.  240. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  19 

settled  by  a  pious  company  of  non-conformists  from  England, 
and  the  printed  books  of  their  pastor  and  leader,  Rev.  Peter 
Bulkeley,  sometime  fellow  of  Saint  John's  College  in  Cam- 
bridge, England,  testify  the  ardent  sentiment  which  they 
shared.  "There  is  no  people,"  said  he  to  his  little  flock  of 
exiles,  "but  will  strive  to  excel  in  something.  What  can 
we  excel  in  if  not  in  holiness?  If  we  look  to  number,  we  are 
the  fewest;  if  to  strength,  we  are  the  weakest;  if  to  wealth 
and  riches,  we  are  the  poorest  of  all  the  people  of  God  through 
the  whole  world.  We  cannot  excel,  nor  so  much  as  equal 
other  people  in  these  things,  and  if  we  come  short  in  grace 
and  holiness  too,  we  are  the  most  despicable  people  under 
heaven.  Strive  we  therefore  herein  to  excel,  and  suffer  not 
this  crown  to  be  taken  away  from  us."*' 

In  respect  to  the  special  studies  which  contribute 
to  education,  Mr.  Emerson  has  little  to  say.  Of 
science,  he  has  a  far  higher  opinion  as  an  educa- 
tional force  than  of  the  ancient  classics.  These 
classics  had  small  value  to  him  in  his  college  career, 
and  of  the  sciences  he  knew  experimentally  little 
or  nothing.  But  he  did  know  them  as  a  philoso- 
pher. At  considerable  length,  Mr.  Emerson  depre- 
ciates the  value  of  Latin  and  Greek  as  a  foundation 
in  the  American  schools  and  colleges.    He  says : 

The  popular  education  has  been  taxed  with  a  want  of  truth 
and  nature.  It  was  complained  that  an  education  to  things 
was  not  given.    We  are  students  of  words:   we  are  shut  up 

'•Address  at  the  opening  of  the  Concord  Free  Public  Library,  Com- 
plete Works,  etc.,  Vol.  XI.,  p.  497. 


20  EDUCATION 

in  schools,  and  colleges,  and  recitation-rooms,  for  ten  or  fif- 
teen years,  and  come  out  at  last  with  a  bag  of  wind,  a  memory 
of  words,  and  do  not  know  a  thing.  We  cannot  use  our 
hands,  or  our  legs,  or  our  eyes,  or  our  arms.  We  do  not 
know  an  edible  root  in  the  woods,  we  cannot  tell  our  course  by 
the  stars,  nor  the  hour  of  the  day  by  the  sun.  It  is  well  if 
we  can  swim  and  skate.  We  are  afraid  of  a  horse,  of  a  cow, 
of  a  dog,  of  a  snake,  of  a  spider.  The  Roman  rule  was  to 
teach  a  boy  nothing  that  he  could  not  learn  standing.  The 
old  English  rule  was,  "All  summer  in  the  field,  and  all 
winter  in  the  study. ' '  And  it  seems  as  if  a  man  should  learn 
to  plant,  or  to  fish,  or  to  hunt,  that  he  might  secure  his  sub- 
sistence at  all  events,  and  not  be  painful  to  his  friends  and 
fellow-men.  The  lessons  of  science  should  be  experimental 
also.  The  sight  of  a  planet  through  a  telescope  is  worth  all 
the  course  on  astronomy;  the  shock  of  the  electric  spark  in 
the  elbow  outvalues  all  the  theories;  the  taste  of  the  nitrous 
oxide,  the  firing  of  an  artificial  volcano,  are  better  than  vol- 
umes of  chemistry. 

One  of  the  traits  of  the  new  spirit  is  the  inquisition  it 
fixed  on  our  scholastic  devotion  to  the  dead  languages.  The 
ancient  languages,  with  great  beauty  of  structure,  contain 
wonderful  remains  of  genius,  which  draw,  and  always  will 
draw,  certain  like-minded  men, — Greek  men,  and  Roman  men, 
— ^in  all  countries,  to  their  study ;  but  by  a  wonderful  drowsi- 
ness of  usage  they  had  exacted  the  study  of  all  men.  Once 
(say  two  centuries  ago),  Latin  and  Greek  had  a  strict  re- 
lation to  all  the  science  and  culture  there  was  in  Europe, 
and  the  Mathematics  had  a  momentary  importance  at  some 
era  of  activity  in  physical  science.  These  things  became  stere- 
otyped as  education,  Bjs.  the  manner  of  men  is.  But  the  Good 
Spirit  never  cared  for  the  colleges,  and  though  all  men  and 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  21 

boys  were  now  drilled  in  Latin,  Greek  and  Mathematics,  it 
had  quite  left  these  shells  high  and  dry  on  the  beach,  and 
was  now  creating  and  feeding  other  matters  at  other  ends 
of  the  world.  But  in  a  hundred  high  schools  and  colleges  this 
warfare  against  common-sense  still  goes  on.  Four,  or  six,  or 
ten  years,  the  pupil  is  parsing  Greek  and  Latin,  and  as  soon 
as  he  leaves  the  University,  as  it  is  ludicrously  styled,  he 
shuts  those  books  for  the  last  time.  Some  thousands  of 
young  men  are  graduated  at  our  colleges  in  this  country 
every  year,  and  the  persons  who,  at  forty  years,  still  read 
Greek,  can  all  be  counted  on  your  hand.  I  never  met  with 
ten.    Four  or  five  persons  I  have  seen  who  read  Plato. 

But  is  not  this  absurd,  that  the  whole  liberal  talent  of  this 
country  should  be  directed  in  its  best  years  on  studies  which 
lead  to  nothing?  What  was  the  consequence?  Some  intelli- 
gent persons  said  or  thought,  ' '  Is  that  Greek  and  Latin  some 
spell  to  conjure  with,  and  not  words  of  reason?  If  the 
physician,  the  lawyer,  the  divine,  never  use  it  to  come  at 
their  ends,  I  need  never  learn  it  to  come  at  mine.  Conjuring 
is  gone  out  of  fashion,  and  I  will  omit  this  conjugating,  and 
go  straight  to  affairs. ' '  So  they  jumped  the  Greek  and  Latin, 
and  read  law,  medicine,  or  sermons,  without  it.  To  the  aston- 
ishment of  all,  the  self-made  men  took  even  ground  at  once 
with  the  oldest  of  the  regular  graduates,  and  in  a  few  months 
the  most  conservative  circles  of  Boston  and  New  York  had 
quite  forgotten  who  of  their  gownsmen  was  college-bred,  and 
who  was  not.** 

But  in  his  ** English  Traits,"  Mr.  Emerson 
considered  and  to  a  degree  approved  of  quite  a 

**"New  England  Befonners,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  VoL  HI.,  pp. 
257-60. 


22  EDUCATION 

different  interpretation  of  the  ancient  classics. 
He  writes: 

The  effect  of  this  drill  is  the  radical  knowledge  of  Greek  and 
Latin  and  of  mathematics,  and  the  solidity  and  taste  of  Eng- 
lish criticism.  Whatever  luck  there  may  be  in  this  or  that 
award,  an  Eton  captain  can  write  Latin  longs  and  shorts, 
can  turn  the  Court-Guide  into  hexameters,  and  it  is  certain 
that  a  Senior  Classic  can  quote  correctly  from  the  Corpus 
Poetarum  and  is  critically  learned  in  all  the  humanities. 
Greek  erudition  exists  on  the  Isis  and  Cam,  whether  the  Maud 
man  or  the  Brasenose  man  be  properly  ranked  or  not;  the 
atmosphere  is  loaded  with  Greek  learning ;  the  whole  river  has 
reached  a  certain  height,  and  kills  all  that  growth  of  weeds 
which  this  Castalian  water  kUls.  The  English  nature  takes 
culture  kindly.  So  Milton  thought.  It  refines  the  Norseman. 
Access  to  the  Greek  mind  lifts  his  standard  of  taste.  He  has 
enough  to  think  of,  and,  unless  of  an  impulsive  nature,  is 
indisposed  from  writing  or  speaking,  by  the  fulness  of  his 
mind  and  the  new  severity  of  his  taste.  The  great  silent  crowd 
of  thoroughbred  Grecians  always  known  to  be  around  him, 
the  English  writer  cannot  ignore.  They  prune  his  orations 
and  point  his  pen.  Hence  the  style  and  tone  of  English  jour- 
nalism. The  men  have  learned  accuracy  and  comprehension, 
logic,  and  pace,  or  speed  of  working.  They  have  bottom,  en- 
durance, wind.  When  bom  with  good  constitutions,  they 
make  those  eupeptic  studying-mills,  the  cast-iron  men,  the 
dura  ilia,  whose  powers  of  performance  compare  with  ours 
as  the  steam-hammer  with  the  music-box ; — Cokes,  Mansfields, 
Seldens  and  Bentleys,  and  when  it  happens  that  a  superior 
Jjrain  puts  a  rider  on  this  admirable  horse,  we  obtain  those 


ACCORDINa  TO  EMERSON  23 

masters  of  the  world  who  combine  the  highest  energy  in  af- 
fairs with  a  supreme  culture.'* 

In  his  interpretation  of  the  great  theme,  Mr. 
Emerson  alludes  again  and  again,  and  under  divers 
conditions,  to  the  relationship,  or  lack  of  relation- 
ship, between  intellect  and  character.  He  uses 
character  in  the  narrow  sense  as  standing  for 
moral  manhood  and  also  in  the  comprehensive 
sense  as  standing  for  the  whole  of  manhood,  includ- 
ing will,  conscience,  heart,  as  well  as  intellect.  He 
usually,  however,  uses  character  in  the  narrow 
sense  and  often  makes  the  relationship  between 
character  and  intellect  one  of  contrast.  In  his 
Journal  for  1844,  at  the  age  of  forty,  he  says : 

Pure  intellect  is  the  pure  devil  when  you  have  ^ot  off 
all  the  masks  of  Mephistopheles.'® 

And  also,  in  the  year  preceding,  he  says : 
The  Intellect  sees  by  moral  obedience.'^ 

In  character,  even  in  the  narrow  sense,  he  in- 
cludes not  only  all  the  cardinal  virtues,  but  also  the 
cardinal  graces.    In  a  striking  paragraph  repre- 

»" English  Traits,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  V.,  pp.  20608. 

••  Journal  XXXV.,  Journals  of  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson,  edited  by  Ed- 
ward Waldo  Emerson  and  Waldo  Emerson  Forbes.  Houghton,  Mifflin 
Co.,  1911.     Vol.  VI.,  p.  497. 

"  Journal  XXXIV.,  Journals,  etc..  Ibid.,  p.  483. 


24  EDUCATION 

senting  both  the  unity  and  the  diversity  in  the  im- 
pression which  the  soul  makes  on  character,  he 
says: 

Character  repudiates  intellect,  yet  excites  it ;  and  character 
passes  into  thought,  is  published  so,  and  then  is  ashamed 
before  new  flashes  of  moral  worth.^^ 

In  a  large  way,  he  declares : 

This  is  the  law  of  moral  and  of  mental  gain.  The  simple 
rise  as  by  specific  levity  not  into  a  particular  virtue,  but 
into  the  region  of  all  the  virtues.  They  are  in  the  spirit  which 
contains  them  all.  The  soul  requires  purity,  but  purity  is 
not  it ;  requires  justice,  but  justice  is  not  that ;  requires  benef- 
icence, but  is  somewhat  better;  so  that  there  is  a  kind  of  de- 
scent and  accommodation  felt  when  we  leave  speaking  of 
moral  nature  to  urge  a  virtue  which  it  enjoins.  To  the  well- 
bom  child  all  the  virtues  are  natural,  and  not  painfully 
acquired.  Speak  to  his  heart,  and  the  man  becomes  sud- 
denly virtuous. 

"Within  the  same  sentiment  is  the  germ  of  intellectual 
growth,  which  obeys  the  same  law.^® 

In  speaking  of  the  relationship  between  Shake- 
speare and  Swedenborg,  he  says : 

The  human  mind  stands  ever  in  perplexity,  demanding  in- 
tellect, demanding  sanctity,  impatient  equally  of  each  with- 
out the  other.^° 

'•"Character,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  III.,  p.  105. 
*» "  The  Over-Soul, ' '  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  II.,  p.  275. 
** " Eepresentative  Men:     Swedenborg,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  VoL 
IV.,  p.  94. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  25 

And  yet  the  intellect  and  the  character,  which 
are  so  diversely  contrasted,  are  closely  knit  and 
intimately  related.  In  speaking  on  Webster  he 
lays  down  the  principle  that  **  great  thoughts  come 
from  the  heart,"  and  uses  the  happy  phrases 
** moral  sensibility,"^^  "moral  perception,"  ** moral 
sentiment.  "^^  Passages  are  these  which  suggest 
Pascal 's  great  phrase : 

The  heart  has  its  reasons  that  the  reason  knows  not  of. 
He  also  declares : 

There  is  an  intimate  interdependence  of  intellect  and  mor- 
als. Given  the  equality  of  two  intellects, — which  will  form 
the  most  reliable  judgments,  the  good,  or  the  bad  hearted? 
"The  heart  has  its  arguments,  with  which  the  understanding 
is  not  acquainted."  For  the  heart  is  at  once  aware  of  the 
state  of  health  or  disease,  which  is  the  controlling  state,  that 
is,  of  sanity  or  of  insanity ;  prior  of  course  to  all  question  of 
the  ingenuity  of  arguments,  the  amount  of  facts,  or  the  ele- 
gance of  rhetoric.  So  intimate  is  this  alliance  of  mind  and 
heart,  that  talent  uniformly  sinks  with  character.^' 

In  his  "Natural  History  of  Intellect,"  he  further 
declares : 

""The  Fugitive  Slave  Law" — Lecture  at  New  York.  Complete 
Works,  etc.,  Vol.  XI.,  p.  223. 

"Ibid.,  p.  205. 

■"The  Conduct  of  Life:  Worship,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  VI., 
p.  217. 


26  EDUCATION 

The  spiritual  power  of  man  is  twofold,  mind  and  heart, 
Intellect  and  morals ;  one  respecting  truth,  the  other  the  will. 
One  is  the  man,  the  other  the  woman  in  spiritual  nature. 
One  is  power,  the  other  is  love.  These  elements  always  coexist 
in  every  normal  individual,  hut  one  predominates.^* 

He  closes  one  of  his  papers  in  the  Dial  on  *'The 
Tragic,"  with  the  remark: 

The  intellect  in  its  purity  and  the  moral  sense  in  its  purity 
are  not  distinguished  from  each  other,  and  both  ravish  us 
into  a  region  whereunto  these  passionate  clouds  of  sorrow 
cannot  rise.^° 

The  nature  of  the  education  which  thus  unites 
character  and  intellect  is  broad.    He  declares : 

Education  should  be  as  broad  as  man.  Whatever  elements 
are  in  him  that  should  foster  and  demonstrate.  If  he  be  dex- 
terous, his  tuition  should  make  it  appear ;  if  he  be  capable  of 
dividing  men  by  the  trenchant  sword  of  his  thought,  educa- 
tion should  unsheathe  and  sharpen  it;  if  he  is  one  to  cement 
society  by  his  all-reconciling  affinities,  oh!  hasten  their  ac- 
tion !  If  he  is  jovial,  if  he  is  mercurial,  if  he  is  great-hearted, 
a  cunning  artificer,  a  strong  commander,  a  potent  ally,  in- 
genious, useful,  elegant,  witty,  prophet,  diviner, — ^society  has 
need  of  all  these.  The  imagination  must  be  addressed.  Why 
always  coast  on  the  surface  and  never  open  the  interior  of 
Nature,  not  by  science,  which  is  surface  still,  but  by  poetry? 

»*" Natural  History  of  Intellect,"  Complete  Works,  etc..  Vol.  XII., 
p.  60. 

**  Papers  from  the  Dial :  * '  The  Tragic, ' '  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Ibid., 
p.  417. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  27 

IS  not  the  Vast  an  element  of  the  mind  ?    Yet  what  teaching, 
what  book  of  this  day  appeals  to  the  Vast? 

Our  culture  has  truckled  to  the  times, — to  the  senses.  It 
is  not  manworthy.  If  the  vast  and  the  spiritual  are  omitted, 
so  are  the  practical  and  the  moral.  It  does  not  make  us 
brave  or  free.  We  teach  boys  to  be  such  men  as  we  are.  We 
do  not  teach  them  to  aspire  to  be  all  they  can.  We  do  not 
give  them  a  training  as  if  we  believed  in  their  noble  nature.'" 

This  breadth  of  education,  however,  should  be 
made  perfectly  consistent  with  two  great  elements : 
the  element  of  drill  and  the  element  of  inspiration. 
Inspiration  without  drill  is  vapid.  Drill  without 
inspiration  is  dull,  phlegmatic.  Both  combined 
produce  the  worthy  scholar  and  man. 

If  he  have  this  twofold  goodness, — the  drill  and  the  inspira- 
tion,— then  he  has  health ;  then  he  is  a  whole,  and  not  a  frag- 
ment; and  the  perfection  of  his  endowment  will  appear  in 
his  compositions.  Indeed,  this  twofold  merit  characterizes 
ever  the  productions  of  great  masters.  The  man  of  genius 
should  occupy  the  whole  space  between  God  or  pure  mind 
and  the  multitude  of  uneducated  men.  He  must  draw  from 
the  infinite  Reason,  on  one  side;  and  he  must  penetrate  into 
the  heart  and  sense  of  the  crowd,  on  the  other.  From  one, 
he  must  draw  his  strength;  to  the  other,  he  must  owe  his 
aim.  The  one  yokes  him  to  the  real ;  the  other,  to  tlie  appar- 
ent. At  one  pole  is  Reason ;  at  the  other.  Common  Sense.  If 
he  be  defective  at  either  extreme  of  the  scale,  his  philosophy 

""Education,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  X.,  p.  134. 


28  EDUCATION 

will  seem  low  and  utilitarian,  or  it  will  appear  too  vague 
and  indefinite  for  the  uses  of  life.^'^ 

Toil  is  the  essence  of  drill,  and  from  it  no  man  is 
to  seek  excuse.  Great  scholars,  great  thinkers,  are 
great  laborers.  The  long  and  insistent  song  of  the 
worth  of  labor  for  the  student,  Emerson  sings  in 
prose  and  verse.    He  says : 

No  way  has  been  found  for  making  heroism  easy,  even  for 
the  scholar.  Labor,  iron  labor,  is  for  him.  The  world  was 
created  as  an  audience  for  him ;  the  atoms  of  which  it  is  made 
are  opportunities.  Read  the  performance  of  Bentley,  of  Gib- 
bon, of  Cuvier,  Geoff roy  Saint-Hilaire,  Laplace.  "He  can 
toil  terribly,"  said  Cecil  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh.  These  few 
words  sting  and  bite  and  lash  us  when  we  are  frivolous.  Let 
us  get  out  of  the  way  of  their  blows  by  making  them  true 
of  ourselves.  There  is  so  much  to  be  done  that  we  ought  to 
begin  quickly  to  bestir  ourselves.  This  day-labor  of  ours, 
we  confess,  has  hitherto  a  certain  emblematic  air,  like  the 
annual  ploughing  and  sowing  of  the  Emperor  of  China.  Let 
us  make  it  an  honest  sweat.  Let  the  scholar  measure  his 
valor  by  his  power  to  cope  with  intellectual  giants.  Leave 
others  to  count  votes  and  calculate  stocks.^^ 

In  this  drill  and  inspiration,  the  student  must 
seek  solitude.  Companionship  is  not  for  him.  His 
lamp  he  himself  lights.  Its  rays  shine  upon  his 
book  alone.   Emerson  always  thought  of  himself  as 

»»" Literary  Ethics,"  Complete  Works,  etc..  Vol.  I.,  p.  182. 
""Greatness,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  VIII.,  p.  311. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  29 

a  man  apart,  as  a  spectator  and  auditor,  as  one  not 

able  to  join  in  other  men's  sports  or  labors.    Out 

of  his  own  experiences,  he  writes : 

He  must  embrace  solitude  as  a  bride.  He  must  have  his 
glees  and  his  glooms  alone.  His  own  estimate  must  be  meas- 
ure enough,  his  own  praise  reward  enough  for  him.  And 
why  must  the  student  be  solitary  and  silent?  That  he  may 
become  acquainted  with  his  thoughts.  If  he  pines  in  a 
lonely  place,  hankering  for  the  crowd,  for  display,  he  is  not 
in  the  lonely  place;  his  heart  is  in  the  market;  he  does  not 
see;  he  does  not  hear;  he  does  not  think.  But  go  cherish 
your  soul;  expel  companions;  set  your  habits  to  a  life  of 
solitude ;  then  will  the  faculties  rise  fair  and  full  within,  like 
forest  trees  and  field  flowers;  you  will  have  results,  which, 
when  you  meet  your  fellow-men,  you  can  communicate,  and 
they  will  gladly  receive.  Do  not  go  into  solitude  only  that 
you  may  presently  come  into  public.  Such  solitude  denies  it- 
self ;  is  public  and  stale.  The  public  can  get  public  experience, 
but  they  wish  the  scholar  to  replace  to  them  those  private, 
sincere,  divine  experiences  of  which  they  have  been  defrauded 
by  dwelling  in  the  street.  It  is  the  noble,  manlike,  just 
thought,  which  is  the  superiority  demanded  of  you,  and  not 
crowds  but  solitude  confers  this  elevation.  Not  insulation 
of  place,  but  independence  of  spirit  is  es.sential,  and  it  is 
only  as  the  garden,  the  cottage,  the  forest  and  the  rock,  are 
a  sort  of  mechanical  aids  to  this,  that  they  are  of  value. 
Think  alone,  and  all  places  are  friendly  and  sacred.*' 

The  qualities  of  the  education  which  man  thus 
receives  are  not  hard  to  deduce.    His  scholarship 

•"Liiterary  Ethics,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  I.,  p.  173. 


30  EDUCATION 

has  to  represent  accuracy.  He  does  not  go  to  the 
scientists  for  his  justification  and  confirmation,  but 
rather  to  the  philosophers. 

Accuracy  is  essential  to  beauty.  The  very  definition  of 
the  intellect  is  Aristotle's:  ''that  by  which  we  know  terms 
or  boundaries."  Give  a  boy  accurate  perceptions.  Teach 
him  the  difference  between  the  similar  and  the  same.  Make 
him  call  things  by  their  right  names.  Pardon  in  him  no 
blunder.  Then  he  will  give  you  solid  satisfaction  as  long  as 
he  lives.  It  is  better  to  teach  the  child  arithmetic  and  Latin 
grammar  than  rhetoric  or  moral  philosophy,  because  they 
require  exactitude  of  performance;  it  is  made  certain  that 
the  lesson  is  mastered,  and  that  power  of  performance  is 
worth  more  than  the  knowledge.*" 

In  this  growing  education  of  the  student,  it  is 
not  to  be  forgotten  that  development  requires  time. 
Since  Emerson  himself  was  a  schoolboy,  two  years 
have  been  saved  in  the  ordinary  education  of  the 
schoolboy,  but  time  still  remains  an  essential  condi- 
tion. It  cannot  do  anything.  It  is  no  agent,  as 
Lord  Bacon  says,  but  it  is  a  necessary  condition  for 
doing.  Nature  seems  to  deceive  us  in  making  us 
believe  that  time  is  not  necessary  for  growth,  but 
the  deception  is  very  bare-faced. 

In  the  year  1841,  at  the  age  of  thirty-eight, 
Emerson  writes  in  his  journal: 

""Education,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  X.,  p.  147. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  31 

It  seems  to  me  sometimes  that  we  get  our  education  ended 
a  little  too  quick  in  this  country.  As  soon  as  we  have  learned 
to  read  and  write  and  cipher,  we  are  dismissed  from  school 
and  we  set  up  for  ourselves.  We  are  writers  and  leaders  of 
opinion  and  we  write  away  without  check  of  any  kind,  play 
whatsoever  mad  prank,  indulge  whatever  spleen,  or  oddity, 
or  obstinacy,  comes  into  our  dear  head,  and  even  feed  our 
complacency  thereon,  and  thus  fine  wits  come  to  nothing,  as 
good  horses  spoil  themselves  by  running  away  and  straining 
themselves.  I  cannot  help  seeing  that  Doctor  Channing 
would  have  been  a  much  greater  writer  had  he  found  a  strict 
tribunal  of  writers,  a  graduated  intellectual  empire  estab- 
lished in  the  land,  and  knew  that  bad  logic  would  not  pass, 
and  that  the  most  severe  exaction  was  to  be  made  on  all  who 
enter  these  lists.  Now,  if  a  man  can  write  a  paragraph  for 
a  newspaper,  next  year  he  writes  what  he  calls  a  history, 
and  reckons  himself  a  classic  incontinently,  nor  will  his  con- 
temporaries in  critical  Journal  or  Review  question  his  claims. 
It  is  very  easy  to  reach  the  degree  of  culture  that  prevails 
around  us;  very  hard  to  pass  it,  and  Doctor  Channing,  had 
he  found  Wordsworth,  Southey,  Coleridge  and  Lamb  around 
him,  would  as  easily  have  been  severe  with  himself  and  risen 
a  degree  higher  as  he  has  stood  where  he  is.  I  mean,  of 
course,  a  genuine  intellectual  tribunal,  not  a  literary  junto 
of  Edinburgh  wits,  or  dull  conventions  of  Quarterly  or  Gen- 
tleman's Reviews.  Somebody  offers  to  teach  me  mathematics. 
I  would  fain  learn.  The  man  is  right.  I  wish  that  the 
writers  of  this  country  would  begin  where  they  now  end 
their  culture.*^ 

"  Journal  XXXII.,  Journals  of,  etc..  Vol.  VI.,  p.  105. 


32  EDUCATION 

In  many  paragraphs  and  pages,  as  I  liave  inti- 
mated, the  great  educationist  seeks  to  interpret  the 
manifold  processes  of  education.  Throughout  the 
volumes  allusions  abound  as  to  the  value  and  to  the 
general  results  of  education.  But  interpretation 
still  more  specific  is  fitting. 

The  intellect  as  standing  for  education  gives 
freedom.  Emerson  agrees  with  Saint  Paul  and 
with  Jesus  Christ  in  the  belief  that  truth  makes 
free.  No  hard  and  fast  decree  rests  upon  the  edu- 
cated man. 

Intellect  annuls  Fate.  So  far  as  a  man  thinks,  he  is  free. 
And  though  nothing  is  more  disgusting  than  the  crowing 
about  liberty  by  slaves,  as  most  men  are,  and  the  flippant  mis- 
taking for  freedom  of  some  paper  preamble  like  a  Declara- 
tion of  Independence  or  the  statute  right  to  vote,  by  those 
who  have  never  dared  to  think  or  to  act, — ^yet  it  is  wholesome 
to  man  to  look  not  at  Fate,  but  the  other  way :  the  practical 
view  is  the  other.  His  sound  relation  to  these  facts  is  to 
use  and  command,  not  to  cringe  to  them.'*^ 

The  trained  mind  has  also  imagination. 

For  we  thus  enter  a  new  gymnasium,  and  learn  to  choose 
men  by  their  truest  marks,  taught,  with  Plato,  *Ho  choose 
those  who  can,  without  aid  from  the  eyes  or  any  other  sense, 
proceed  to  truth  and  to  being. ' '  Foremost  among  these  activi- 
ties are  the  summersaults,  spells  and  resurrections  wrought 

*»"The  Conduct  of  Life:  Fate,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  VI., 
p.  23. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  33 

by  the  imagination.  When  this  wakes,  a  man  seems  to  mul- 
tiply ten  times  or  a  thousand  times  his  force.  It  opens  the 
delicious  sense  of  indeterminate  size  and  inspires  an  auda- 
cious mental  habit.  We  are  as  elastic  as  the  gas  of  gun- 
powder, and  a  sentence  in  a  book,  or  a  word  dropped  in 
conversation,  sets  free  our  fancy,  and  instantly  our  heads  are 
bathed  with  galaxies,  and  our  feet  tread  the  floor  of  the 
Pit.  And  this  benefit  is  real  because  we  are  entitled  to  these 
enlargements,  and  once  having  passed  the  bounds  shall  never 
again  be  quite  the  miserable  pedants  we  were.*' 

The  intellect,  moreover,  is  the  consoler  of  man. 

The  intellect  is  a  consoler,  which  delights  in  detaching  or 
putting  an  interval  between  a  man  and  his  fortune,  and  so 
converts  the  sufferer  into  a  spectator  and  his  pain  into 
poetry.  It  yields  the  joys  of  conversation,  of  letters  and  of 
science.  Hence  also  the  torments  of  life  become  tuneful  trag- 
edy, solemn  and  soft  with  music,  and  garnished  with  rich 
dark  pictures.** 

The  intellect  represents  one  element  of  the  essen- 
tial greatness  of  hmnanity.  In  a  noble  passage  on 
greatness,  he  says : 

It  is  easy  to  draw  traits  from  Napoleon,  who  was  not  gen- 
erous nor  just,  but  was  intellectual  and  knew  the  law  of 
things.  Napoleon  commands  our  respect  by  his  enormous  self- 
trust,  the  habit  of  seeing  with  his  own  eyes,  never  the  surface, 

*• ' '  Representative  Men :  Uses  of  Great  Men, ' '  Complete  Works,  etc., 
Vol.  IV.,  p.  17. 

** Papers  from  the  Dial:  "The  Tragic,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol. 
Xir.,  p.  416. 


34  EDUCATION 

but  to  the  heart  of  the  matter,  whether  it  was  a  road,  a  can- 
non, a  character,  an  officer,  or  a  king, — and  by  the  speed  and 
security  of  his  action  in  the  premises,  always  new.  He  has 
left  a  library  of  manuscripts,  a  multitude  of  sayings,  every 
one  of  widest  application.  He  was  a  man  who  always  fell 
on  his  feet.  When  one  of  his  favorite  schemes  missed,  he  had 
the  faculty  of  taking  up  his  genius,  as  he  said,  and  of  carry- 
ing it  somewhere  else.  * '  Whatever  they  may  tell  you,  believe 
that  one  fights  with  cannon  as  with  fists;  when  once  the  fire 
is  begun,  the  least  want  of  ammunition  renders  what  you 
have  done  already  useless."  I  find  it  easy  to  translate  all 
his  technics  into  all  of  mine,  and  his  official  advices  are  to 
me  more  literary  and  philosophical  than  the  memoirs  of  the 
Academy.  His  advice  to  his  brother,  King  Joseph  of  Spain, 
was :  "I  have  only  one  counsel  for  you, — Be  Master. ' '  Depth 
of  intellect  relieves  even  the  ink  of  crime  with  a  fringe  of 
light." 

The  value  of  the  higher  education,  Mr.  Emerson 
says,  is  in  certain  ways  imaginary  and  in  others 
real.  One  seldom  meets  a  great  man  who  has  not 
gone  to  college  who  does  not  lament  what  he  has 
missed,  and  one  seldom  meets  a  great  man  who  has 
been  in  college  who  is  not  inclined  to  depreciate  the 
worth  of  what  the  college  was  to  him.  Both  ideas 
are  equally  true  and  equally  false.  The  college 
ought  to  have  made  the  college  man  abler,  not  mak- 
ing him  less  human ;  and  not  going  to  college,  if  it 
has  served  to  bring  out  the  natural  forces  of  the 

«" Greatness,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  VIII.,  p.  314. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  35 

other  man,  might  also  have  brought  them  out  in 
unfitting  ways  and  unto  unworthy  results.  Mr. 
Emerson  says: 

We  are  full  of  superstitions.  Each  class  fixes  its  eyes  on 
tlie  advantages  it  has  not;  the  refined,  on  rude  strength;  the 
democrat,  on  birth  and  breeding.  One  of  the  benefits  of  a 
college  education  is  to  show  the  boy  its  little  avail.  I  knew  a 
leading  man  in  a  leading  city,  who,  having  set  his  heart  on 
an  education  at  the  university  and  missed  it,  could  never 
quite  feel  himself  the  equal  of  his  own  brothers  who  had 
gone  thither.  His  easy  superiority  to  multitudes  of  pro- 
fessional men  could  never  quite  countervail  to  him  this  imag- 
inary defect.  Balls,  riding,  wine-parties  and  billiards  pass  to 
a  poor  boy  for  something  fine  and  romantic,  which  they  are 
not;  and  a  free  admission  to  them  on  an  equal  footing,  if 
it  were  possible,  only  once  or  twice,  would  be  worth  ten 
times  its  cost,  by  undeceiving  him.*' 

In  his  essay  on  *  *  Spiritual  Laws, ' '  he  also  writes : 

My  will  never  gave  the  images  in  my  mind  the  rank  they 
now  take.  The  regular  course  of  studies,  the  years  of  aca- 
demical and  professional  education  have  not  yielded  me  bet- 
ter facts  than  some  idle  books  under  the  bench  at  the  Latin 
School.  What  we  do  not  call  education  is  more  precious  than 
that  which  we  call  so.  We  form  no  guess,  at  the  time  of  re- 
ceiving a  thought,  of  its  comparative  value.  And  education 
oft€n  wastes  its  effort  in  attempts  to  thwart  and  balk  this 
natural  magnetism,  which  is  sure  to  select  what  belongs  to  it.*^ 

«'"The  Conduct  of  Life:  Culture,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  VI., 
p.  144. 

""Spiritual  Laws,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  IL,  p.  133. 


36  EDUCATION 

But,  when  all  is  said  and  done,  the  argument  as 
to  value  rests  in  favor  of  the  college.  The  college 
may  not  do  much  for  the  genius ;  but  for  the  com- 
mon man  its  worth  is  tremendous.  Genius  is  shy, 
hard  to  catch,  does  not  easily  lend  itself  to  associa- 
tion. The  college  represents  a  collection,  an  assem- 
bly, of  men  each  drawn  to  the  other,  each  in  a 
sense  educating  the  other.  The  college  may  not 
train  genius,  but  it  can  adorn  genius  and  adorn  it 
with  beauty. 

This,  then,  is  the  theory  of  Education,  the  happy  meeting 
of  the  young  soul,  filled  with  the  desire,  with  the  living  teacher 
who  has  already  made  the  passage  from  the  centre  forth, 
step  by  step,  along  the  intellectual  roads  to  the  theory  and 
practice  of  special  science.  Now  if  there  be  genius  in  the 
scholar,  that  is,  a  delicate  sensibility  to  the  laws  of  the 
world,  and  the  power  to  express  them  again  in  some  new 
form,  he  is  made  to  find  his  own  way.  He  will  greet  joy- 
fully the  wise  teacher,  but  colleges  and  teachers  are  no  wise 
essential  to  him;  he  will  find  teachers  everywhere,** 

In  summing  up  the  advantages  and  disadvan- 
tages of  the  college  in  Mr.  Emerson's  judgment, 
one  cannot  do  better  than  to  quote  the  concluding 
passage  from  English  Traits  on  the  Universities. 
It  is  said : 

""The  Celebration  of  Intellect,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  XII., 
p.  128. 


ACCORDING  TO  EMERSON  37 

Universities  are  of  course  hostile  to  geniuses,  which,  see- 
ing and  using  ways  of  their  own,  discredit  the  routine:  as 
churches  and  monasteries  persecute  youthful  saints.  Yet  we 
all  send  our  sons  to  college,  and  though  he  be  a  genius,  the 
youth  must  take  his  chance.  The  university  must  be  retro- 
spective. The  gale  that  gives  direction  to  the  vanes  on  all 
its  towers  blows  out  of  antiquity.  Oxford  is  a  library,  and 
the  professors  must  be  librarians.  And  I  should  as  soon  think 
of  quarrelling  with  the  janitor  for  not  magnifying  his  office 
by  hostile  sallies  into  the  street,  like  the  Governor  of  Kertch 
or  Kinburn,  as  of  quarrelling  with  the  professors  for  not 
admiring  the  young  neologists  who  pluck  the  beards  of  Euclid 
and  Aristotle,  or  for  not  attempting  themselves  to  fill  their 
vacant  shelves  as  original  writers. 

It  is  easy  to  carp  at  colleges,  and  the  college,  if  we  will 
wait  for  it,  will  have  its  own  turn.  Genius  exists  there  also, 
but  will  not  answer  a  call  of  a  committee  of  the  House  of 
Commons.  It  is  rare,  precarious,  eccentric  and  darkling. 
England  is  the  land  of  mixture  and  surprise,  and  when  you 
have  settled  it  that  the  universities  are  moribund,  out  comes 
a  poetic  influence  from  the  heart  of  Oxford,  to  mould  the 
opinions  of  cities,  to  build  their  houses  as  simply  as  birds 
their  nests,  to  give  veracity  to  art  and  charm  mankind,  as 
an  appeal  to  moral  order  always  must.  But  besides  this 
restorative  genius,  the  best  poetry  of  England  of  this  age,  in 
the  old  forms,  comes  from  two  graduates  at  Cambridge.*® 

""English  Traits,  Universities,"  Complete  Works,  etc.,  Vol.  V.,  p. 
212. 


II 

EDUCATION  ACCORDING  TO  CAELYLE 

CARLYLE  was  a  great  spirit.  His  books  are 
the  chief  or  only  exponents  of  his  greatness 
and  spirituality.  Like  many  other  great  souls  he 
was  a  bundle  of  inconsistencies  and  contradictions. 
He  was  at  once  a  pessimist  and  an  optimist ;  in  his 
tastes  a  democrat,  in  his  theories  an  aristocrat; 
commending  silence,  but  giving  us  monologues  in 
many  volumes ;  an  incarnation  of  great  power,  in- 
tellectual and  emotional,  but  irritated  by  the  com- 
mon pains  and  penalties  of  life ;  a  Scotchman  who 
most  strenuously  promoted  the  doctrine  of  the  real, 
the  great,  the  good.  The  strong  man,  the  hero, 
whether  in  literature  or  in  history,  represented  his 
supreme  human  idol. 

Carlyle's  thoughts  about  education,  scattered 
throughout  the  eight  thousand  pages  of  his  twenty 
volumes,  are,  however,  far  more  consistent  and 
more  free  from  contradictions,  in  a  realm  of 
thought  where  consistency  and  freedom  from  con- 
tradiction are  seldom  found,  than  one  would  be  in- 
clined to  believe. 

38 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  39 

The  subject  of  education  is  man.  And  who  and 
what  is  man  ?  He  is  not,  according  to  Carlyle's  in- 
terpretation, a  worm  of  the  dust,  nor  is  he  a  but- 
terfly of  beautiful  existence ;  rather  he  is  the  child 
of  God,  a  creature  bom  into  an  infinite  universe 
and  destined  for  an  eternal  existence.  For  him  the 
centuries  have  labored,  through  him  all  the  past  is 
given  to  the  future,  and  to  him  all  the  future  is 
bound  in  behalf  of  its  worthy  creatures  yet  to  be. 
No  prize  is  too  high  for  his  struggle,  and  no  train- 
ing is  too  severe  for  this  child  of  the  gods,  this 
brother  of  the  immortals.  For  him  too,  this  crea- 
ture of  origin  so  noble,  of  destiny  so  sublime,  no 
education  is  too  enriching.  With  Platonic  mys- 
ticism, Carlyle  interprets  the  subject  of  education. 

"To  the  eye  of  vulgar  Logic,"  says  he,  "what  is  man? 
An  omnivorous  Biped  that  wears  Breeches.  To  the  eye  of 
Pure  Reason  what  is  he?  A  Soul,  a  Spirit,  and  divine  Ap- 
parition. Round  his  mysterious  Me,  there  lies,  under  all 
those  wool- rags,  a  garment  of  Flesh  (or  of  Senses),  contex- 
tured  in  the  Loom  of  Heaven;  whereby  he  is  revealed  to 
his  like,  and  dwells  with  them  in  Union  and  Division;  and 
sees  and  fashions  for  himself  a  Universe,  with  azure  Starry 
Spaces,  and  long  Thousands  of  Years.  Deep-hidden  is  he 
under  that  strange  Garment;  amid  Sounds  and  Colors  and 
Forms,  as  it  were,  swathed  in,  and  inextricably  over-shrouded : 
yet  it  is  sky-woven,  and  worthy  of  a  God.  Stands  he  not 
thereby  in  the  centre  of  Immensities,  in  the  conflux  of  Eterni- 


40  EDUCATION 

ties?  He  feels;  power  has  been  given  him  to  know,  to  be- 
lieve; nay  does  not  the  spirit  of  Love,  free  in  its  celestial 
primeval  brightness,  even  here,  though  but  for  moments,  look 
through  ?  Well  said  Saiat  Chrysostom,  with  his  lips  of  gold, 
'the  true  Shekinah  is  Man:'  where  else  is  the  GtOd's-Pres- 
ENCE  manifested  not  to  our  eyes  only,  but  to  our  hearts,  as 
in  our  fellow-man  ? "  ^ 

Such  is  Carlyle's  perception,  according  to  his 
autobiography,  ''Sartor  Resartus,"  of  the  man  who 
is  to  be  educated.  Man  is  thus  made  only  a  little 
lower  than  the  gods  and  is  crowned  with  glory  and 
honor. 

In  man  the  chief  though  not  the  only  power  to  be 
educated  is  the  intellect.  The  intellect  is  the  fount 
and  origin  of  other  forces  and  excellences.  It  is 
that  part  of  man  which  is  capable  of  the  highest 
improvement.  At  birth  it  is  the  weakest  faculty  in 
man,  weaker  than  it  is  in  the  animal.  It  grows 
apace,  develops,  and  becomes  united  with  the  will, 
the  ruler  of  the  created  world.  Man's  capabilities, 
the  root  of  which  is  intellect,  are  infinite.  Instinct 
has  no  like  capacity  for  im]i¥#vement.  It  is  as  per- 
fect at  birth  as  in  age.  Intellect  is  intrinsically  the 
noblest  part  of  man's  being.  Of  this  man  of  intel- 
lect Carlyle  says : 

*  *  *  Sartor  Resartus, ' '  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  I.,  p.  50. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  41 

...  A  man  of  Intellect,  of  real  and  not  sham  Intellect,  is 
by  the  nature  of  him  likewise  inevitably  a  man  of  nobleness, 
a  man  of  courage,  rectitude,  pious  strength;  who,  even  be- 
cause he  is  and  has  been  loyal  to  the  Laws  of  this  Universe, 
is  initiated  into  discernment  of  the  same;  to  this  hour  a 
Missioned  of  Heaven;  whom  if  men  follow,  it  will  be  well 
with  them;  whom  if  men  do  not  follow,  it  will  not  be  well. 
Human  Intellect,  if  you  consider  it  well,  is  the  exact  summary 
of  Human  Worth;  and  the  essence  of  all  worth-ships  and  wor- 
ships is  reverence  for  that  same.* 

The  lack  of  this  element  of  intellect  produces 
grievous  evils,  and  of  these  are  many  kinds;  per- 
haps the  chief  of  them  being  a  lack  of  wisdom. 
But  education  acting  upon  the  intellect  serves  to 
correct  this  primary  quality  and  element.  It  cre- 
ates wisdom. 

Wisdom  has  been  defined  by  Burke  as  the  ap- 
plication of  knowledge  to  affairs.  Solomon  also 
has  given  many  definitions  still  well  worth  consid- 
ering. Of  this  superb  quality  and  of  the  man  who 
embodies  it  Carlyle  says : 

The  wise  man ;  the  man  with  the  gift  of  method,  of  faith- 
fulness and  valor,  all  o^which  are  of  the  basis  of  wisdom; 
who  has  insight  into  whtrt  is  what,  into  what  will  follow  out 
of  what,  the  eye  to  see  and  the  hand  to  do;  who  is  ^f  to 
administer,  to  direct,  and  guidingly  command:    he  is  the 

*  * ' Latter-Day  Pamphlets,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol. 
II.,  p.  358. 


42  EDUCATION 

strong  man.  His  muscles  and  bones  are  no  stronger  than 
ours;  but  his  soul  is  stronger,  his  soul  is  wiser,  clearer, — is 
better  and  nobler,  for  that  is,  has  been  and  ever  will  be  the 
root  of  all  clearness  worthy  of  such  a  name.  Beautiful  it  is, 
and  a  gleam  from  the  same  eternal  pole-star  visible  amid  the 
destinies  of  men,  that  all  talent,  all  intellect  is  in  the  first 
place  moral; — what  a  world  were  this  otherwise!  But  it 
is  the  heart  always  that  sees,  before  the  head  can  see :  let  us 
know  that;  and  know  therefore  that  the  Good  alone  is  death- 
less and  victorious,  that  Hope  is  sure  and  steadfast,  in  all 
phases  of  this  "Place  of  Hope."' 

It  was  many  years  after  Carlyle  wrote  the  essay 
on  ** Chartism"  from  which  this  quotation  is  taken 
that  he  was  chosen  rector  of  the  University  of 
Edinburgh.  At  the  time  of  his  installation  he  gave 
the  most  famous  of  all  his  addresses — and  his  ad- 
dresses were  few,  be  it  said — which  teems  with 
advice  to  the  students  to  whom  he  spoke.  At  this 
time,  too,  he  referred  to  wisdom. 

You  are  ever  to  bear  in  miud  that  there  lies  behind  that 
the  acquisition  of  what  may  be  called  wisdom; — namely, 
sound  appreciation  and  just  decision  as  to  all  the  objects  that 
come  round  you,  and  the  habit  of  behaving  with  justice,  can- 
dor, dear  insight  and  loyal  adherence  to  fact.  Great  is  wis- 
dom; infinite  is  the  value  of  wisdom.  It  cannot  be  exag- 
gerated; it  is  the  highest  achievement  of  man:  "Blessed  is 
he  that  getteth  understanding, "  *  ^ 

•"Chartism,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estea  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  XVI.,  p.  63. 

•"Inaugural  Address,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estea  &  Lauriat,  Ibid., 
f.  404. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  43 

The  wisdom  to  which  the  master  refers  is  wisdom 
in  the  sense  of  Solomon.  It  refers  to  excellence 
both  intellectual  and  moral.  It  stands  for  an  in- 
tellect which  sees  truth  clearly,  accurately,  largely, 
comprehensively  and  in  its  symmetry.  It  also  re- 
fers to  a  heart  of  which  the  emotions  are  pure  and 
to  a  will  of  which  the  choices  are  right.  It  repre- 
sents the  Greek  ideal  of  the  true,  the  good,  and  the 
beautiful.  The  Greek,  the  Hebrew  and  the  Scotch 
meet  in  the  interpretation  and  commendation  of 
the  great  virtue. 

For  securing  this  most  excellent  thing,  two  meth- 
ods at  least  are  specially  provided.  The  first  is  the 
university.  But  in  the  quest  of  wisdom  it  may 
itself  fail.  Of  such  failure  there  is  no  lack  of  con- 
viction in  the  pages  of  Carlyle,  and  especially  in 
**  Sartor  Resartus."  He  is  indeed  free  in  cursing 
and  heaping  ridicule  upon  the  university.  He 
makes  the  writer  of  the  ''Volume  on  Clothes'*  say: 

"The  hungry  young  .  .  .  looked  up  to  their  spiritual 
Nurses;  and,  for  food,  were  bidden  eat  the  east- wind.  What 
vain  jargon  of  controversial  Metaphysic,  Etymology,  and  me- 
chanical Manipulation  falsely  named  Science,  was  current 
there,  I  indeed  learned,  better  perhaps  than  the  most.  Among 
eleven  hundred  Christian  youths,  there  will  not  be  wanting 
some  eleven  eager  to  learn.  By  collision  with  such,  a  certain 
warmth,  a  certain  polish  was  communicated;  by  instinct  and 


44  EDUCATION 

happy  accident,  I  took  less  to  rioting  (renommiren) ,  than 
to  thinking  and  reading,  which  latter  also  I  was  free  to  do. 
Nay  from  the  chaos  of  that  Library,  I  succeeded  in  fishing 
up  more  books  perhaps  than  had  been  known  to  the  very 
keepers  thereof.  The  foundation  of  a  Literary  Life  was 
hereby  laid :  I  learned,  on  my  own  strength,  to  read  fluently 
in  almost  all  cultivated  languages,  on  almost  all  subjects  and 
sciences;  farther,  as  man  is  ever  the  prime  object  to  man, 
already  it  was  my  favorite  employment  to  read  character  in 
speculation,  and  from  the  Writing  to  construe  the  Writer.  A 
certain  groundplan  of  Human  Nature  and  Life  began  to 
fashion  itself  in  me;  wondrous  enough,  now  when  I  look 
back  on  it;  for  my  whole  Universe,  physical  and  spiritual, 
was  as  yet  a  Machine !  However,  such  a  conscious,  recognized 
groundplan,  the  truest  I  had,  was  beginning  to  be  there,  and 
by  additional  experiments  might  be  corrected  and  indefinitely 
extended."^ 

This  bit  of  autobiography  bears  on  the  subjec- 
tivity of  Carlyle's  interpretation  of  the  university 
experience  of  his  greatest  personal  hero,  Goethe. 
Concerning  Goethe's  life  at  Leipzig,  he  says: 

Leipzig  University  has  the  honor  of  matriculating  him.  The 
name  of  his  "propitious  mother"  she  may  boast  of,  but  not 
of  the  reality:  alas,  in  these  days,  the  University  of  the 
Universe  is  the  only  propitious  mother  of  such;  all  other 
propitious  mothers  are  but  unpropitious  superannuated  dry- 
nurses  fallen  bedrid,  from  whom  the  famished  nursling  has 
to  steal  even  bread  and  water,  if  he  will  not  die;  whom  for 
most  part  he  soon  takes  leave  of,  giving  perhaps  (as  in  Gib- 

» "Sartor  Eesartus,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  VoL  I.,  p.  87. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  45 

bon's  case),  for  farewell  thanks,  some  rough  tweak  of  the 
nose;  and  rushes  desperate  into  the  wide  world  an  orphan. 
The  time  is  advancing,  slower  or  faster,  when  the  bedrid  dry- 
nurse  will  decease,  and  be  succeeded  by  a  walking  and  stir- 
ring wet  one.  Goethe's  employments  and  culture  at  Leipzig 
lay  in  quite  other  groves  than  the  academic:  he  listened  to 
the  Ciceronian  Emesti  with  eagerness,  but  the  life-giving 
word  flowed  not  from  his  mouth;  to  the  sacerdotal,  eclectic- 
sentimental  Gellert  (the  divinity  of  all  tea-table  moral-phi- 
losophers of  both  sexes)  ;  witnessed  "the  pure  soul,  the  genu- 
ine will  of  the  noble  man, ' '  heard  *  *  his  admonitions,  warnings 
and  entreaties,  uttered  in  a  somewhat  hollow  and  melancholy 
tone;"  and  then  the  Frenchmen  say  to  it  all,  "Lmssez  le 
faire;  il  nous  forme  des  dupes.'*  "In  logic  it  seemed  to 
me  very  strange  that  I  must  now  take  up  those  spiritual  opera- 
tions which  from  of  old  I  had  executed  with  the  utmost  con- 
venience, and  tatter  them  asunder,  insulate  and  as  if  destroy 
them,  that  their  right  employment  might  become  plain  to 
me.  Of  the  Thing,  of  the  World,  of  God,  I  fancied  I  knew 
almost  about  as  much  as  the  Doctor  himself;  and  he  seemed 
to  me,  in  more  than  one  place,  to  hobble  dreadfully  {gewaltig 
zu  hapern).'*^ 

This  opinion  of  the  worthlessness  of  universities 
Carlyle  expresses  in  diverse  forms  and  ways.  The 
university  represents,  and  it  necessarily  repre- 
sents, a  certain  orderliness  which  was  especially 
repugnant  to  Carlyle.  It  represents  a  certain 
amount  of  team-work  which  did  not  receive  the 

•"Goethe's  Works,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  XV., 
p.  47. 


46  EDUCATION 

commendation  of  the  great  individualist.  Still, 
that  in  these  two  diatribes,  one  directed  against 
Leipzig,  and  the  other,  without  doubt,  referring  to 
Edinburgh,  Carlyle  did  touch  on  great  evils  in 
university  administration,  is  not  for  one  instant  to 
be  doubted. 

A  second  and  still  more  important  means  for 
securing  this  great  result  of  wisdom  is  the  book. 
Throughout  his  volumes  Carlyle  refers  to  the  worth 
of  the  book.  These  allusions  begin  early  and  con- 
tinue to  the  end.  In  the  essay  on  the  Hero  as  Man 
of  Letters,  he  says : 

Do  not  Books  still  accomplish  miracles,  as  Runes  were 
fabled  to  do?  They  persuade  men.  Not  the  wretchedest  cir- 
culating-library novel,  which  foolish  girls  thumb  and  con  in 
remote  villages,  but  will  help  to  regulate  the  actual  practical 
weddings  and  households  of  those  foolish  girls.  So  "Celia" 
felt,  so  "Clifford"  acted:  the  foolish  Theorem  of  Life, 
stamped  into  those  young  brains,  comes  out  as  a  solid  Prac- 
tice one  day.  Consider  whether  any  Rune  in  the  wildest 
imagination  of  Mythologist  ever  did  such  wonders  as,  on 
the  actual  firm  Earth,  some  Books  have  done!  What  built 
St.  Paul's  Cathedral?  Look  at  the  heart  of  the  matter,  it 
was  that  divine  Hebrew  Book, — the  word  partly  of  the  man 
Moses,  an  outlaw  tending  his  Midianitish  herds,  four  thou- 
sand years  ago,  in  the  wilderness  of  Sinai !  It  is  the  strangest 
of  things,  yet  nothing  is  truer.  With  the  art  of  Writing,  of 
which  Printing  is  a  simple,  an  inevitable  and  comparatively 
insignificant  corollary,  the  true  reign  of  miracles  for  man- 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  47 

kind  commenced.  It  related,  with  a  wondrous  new  contipiity 
and  perpetual  closeness,  the  Past  and  Distant  with  the  Pres- 
ent in  time  and  place;  all  times  and  all  places  with  this  our 
actual  Here  and  Now.  All  things  were  altered  for  men;  all 
modes  of  important  work  of  men:  teaching,  preaching,  gov- 
erning, and  all  else.^ 

In  his  inaugural  address  Carlyle  gives  to  the 
students  sound  counsel  also  in  reference  to  read- 
ing: 

Well,  Gentlemen,  whatever  you  may  think  of  these  histori- 
cal points,  the  clearest  and  most  imperative  duty  lies  on 
every  one  of  you  to  be  assiduous  in  your  reading.  Learn  to 
be  good  readers, — which  is  perhaps  a  more  difficult  thing 
than  you  imagine.  Learn  to  be  discriminative  in  your  read- 
ing; to  read  faithfully,  and  with  your  best  attention,  all 
kinds  of  things  which  you  have  a  real  interest  in,  a  real  not 
an  imaginary,  and  which  you  find  to  be  really  fit  for  what  you 
are  engaged  in.  Of  course,  at  the  present  time,  in  a  great 
deal  of  the  reading  incumbent  on  you,  you  must  be  guided 
by  the  books  recommended  by  your  Professors  for  assistance 
towards  the  effect  of  their  prelections.  And  then,  when  you 
leave  the  University,  and  go  into  studies  of  your  own,  you 
will  find  it  very  important  that  you  have  chosen  a  field,  some 
province  specially  suited  to  you,  in  which  you  can  study  and 
work.  The  most  unhappy  of  all  men  is  the  man  who  cannot 
tell  what  he  is  going  to  do,  who  has  got  no  work  cut  out  for 
him  in  the  world,  and  does  not  go  into  it.    For  work  is  the 

'**The  Hero  as  Man  of  Letters,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat, 
Vol.  L,  p.  383. 


48  EDUCATION 

grand  cure  of  all  the  maladies  and  miseries  that  ever  beset 
mankind, — honest  work,  which  you  intend  getting  done. 

If,  in  any  vacant  vague  time,  you  are  in  a  strait  as  to 
choice  of  reading, — a  very  good  indication  for  you,  perhaps 
the  best  you  could  get,  is  towards  some  book  you  have  a 
great  curiosity  about.  You  are  then  in  the  readiest  and  best 
of  all  possible  conditions  to  improve  by  that  book.  It  is 
analogous  to  what  doctors  tell  us  about  the  physical  health 
and  appetites  of  the  patient.  You  must  learn,  however,  to 
distinguish  between  false  appetite  and  true.  There  is  such 
a  thing  as  a  false  appetite,  which  wiU  lead  a  man  into  vagaries 
with  regard  to  diet ;  will  tempt  him  to  eat  spicy  things,  which 
he  should  not  eat  at  all,  nor  would,  but  that  the  things  are 
toothsome,  and  that  he  is  under  a  momentary  baseness  of 
mind.  A  man  ought  to  examine  and  find  out  what  he  really 
and  truly  has  an  appetite  for,  what  suits  his  constitution  and 
condition;  and  that,  doctors  tell  him,  is  in  general  the  very 
thing  he  ought  to  have.    And  so  with  books.* 

To  Carlyle  the  university  is  a  collection  of  books. 
The  man  who  has  read  well  has  received  a  univer- 
sity education,  both  as  a  means  and  as  a  result. 

Of  such  culture  and  strength,  speech  has  long 
been  regarded  as  the  chief  sign  and  symbol.  In 
*  ^Latter-Day  Pamphlets''  and  in  the  **  Inaugural 
Address"  Carlyle  praises  silence.  He  believes  that 
the  world  and  everybody  in  it  talks  too  much.  To 
watch  the  tongue  and  to  watch  it  unto  curbing  it  is 

•  *  *  Inaugural  Address, ' '  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  XVI., 
p.  393. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  49 

a  duty.  Wind,  wind,  wind,  seems  to  be  universal ; 
it  is  to  be  made  to  vanish  so  far  as  can  be.  He  even 
advises  that  tongues  be  cut  out  for  a  whole  gen- 
eration in  order  that  the  world  may  leam  wisdom ! 
The  reason  of  all  this  is  that  speech  is  largely 
vanity  and  emptiness.  On  the  other  hand  speech 
that  is  filled  with  wisdom  is  "noble  and  even 
divine.''  If  Carlyle  has  been  most  vigilant  in  de- 
nouncing talk  that  is  foolish,  he  is  equally  enthusi- 
astic in  commending  talk  that  is  wise.  Even  in 
the  Latter-Day  Pamphlet  "Stump-Orator,"  he 
says: 

Considered  as  the  last  finish  of  education,  or  of  human 
culture,  worth  and  acquirement,  the  art  of  speech  is  noble, 
and  even  divine;  it  is  like  the  kindling  of  a  Heaven's  light 
to  show  us  what  a  glorious  world  exists,  and  has  perfected 
itself,  in  a  man.' 

And  also  in  the  same  essay  half -humorously  he 
adds: 

Parliament,  Church,  Law:  let  the  young  vivid  soul  turn 
whither  he  will  for  a  career,  he  finds  among  variable  condi- 
tions one  condition  invariable,  and  extremely  surprising,  That 
the  proof  of  excellence  is  to  be  done  by  the  tongue.  For 
heroism  that  will  not  speak,  but  only  act,  there  is  no  account 
kept: — The  English  Nation  does  not  need  that  silent  kind, 

•"Latter-Day  Pamphlets,"  Edition  de  Luze,  Estes  &  Laariat,  VoL 
II.,  p.  426. 


m  EDUCATION 

then,  but  only  the  talking  kind?  Most  astonishing.  Of  all 
the  organs  a  man  has,  there  is  none  held  in  account,  it  would 
appear,  but  the  tongue  he  uses  for  talking.  Premiership, 
woolsack,  mitre,  and  quasi-crown:  all  is  attainable  if  you 
can  talk  with  due  ability.  Everywhere  your  proof-shot  is 
to  be  a  well-fired  volley  of  talk.  Contrive  to  talk  well,  you 
will  get  to  Heaven,  the  modern  Heaven  of  the  English.*" 

The  result  of  all  education  and  training  is  light, 
light  upon  all  of  life's  problems  and  on  many  of 
life's  mysteries. 

Light  is  the  one  thing  wanted  for  the  world.  Put  wisdom 
in  the  head  of  the  world,  the  world  will  fight  its  battle  vic- 
toriously, and  be  the  best  world  man  can  make  it.** 

In  a  personal  way  the  result  of  all  this  education 
and  training  is,  for  the  individual  man,  thinking. 
The  education  of  man  unto  wisdom  is,  as  I  have 
already  intimated,  inseparable  from  training  in 
morals,  and  the  chief  excellence  in  morals,  accord- 
ing to  the  gospel  of  Carlyle,  is  sincerity.  Sincerity 
is  the  culmination  of  all  the  cardinal  virtues.  It  is 
comprehensive.  Insincere  speech  is  the  index  of 
insincere  action  and  of  all  possible  evil  activities. 
A  nimble  tongue  utters  an  octavo  volume  a  day 
and  this  volume  is  in  large  part  designing  balder- 

^"IMd.,  p.  431. 

""Heroes  and  Hero- Worship, "  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat, 
VoL  I.,  p.  391. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  51 

dash.  The  insincere  man  is  a  bad  man,  and  the  bad 
man  an  insincere  one.  The  great  virtue  is  honesty, 
and  the  great  vice  which  Carlyle  constantly  damned 
is  hypocrisy. 

Education  is  designed  to  promote  sincerity  and 
honesty : 

For  no  man,  and  for  no  body  or  biggest  multitude  of 
men,  has  Nature  favor,  if  they  part  company  with  her  facts 
and  her.  Excellent  stump-orator;  eloquent  parliamentary 
dead-dog,  making  motions,  passing  bills ;  reported  in  the  Morn- 
ing Newspapers,  and  reputed  the  * '  best  speaker  going  ? ' '  From 
the  Universe  of  Fact  he  has  turned  himself  away;  he  is 
gone  into  partnership  with  the  Universe  of  Phantasm;  finds 
it  profitablest  to  deal  in  forged  notes,  while  the  foolish  shop- 
keepers will  accept  them.  Nature  for  such  a  man,  and  for 
Nations  that  follow  such,  has  her  patibulary  forks,  and  prisons 
of  death  everlasting: — dost  thou  doubt  it?  Unhappy  mortal, 
Nature  otherwise  were  herself  a  Chaos  and  no  Cosmos.  Na- 
ture was  not  made  by  an  Impostor ;  not  she,  I  think,  rife  as 
they  are! — In  fact,  by  money  or  otherwise,  to  the  uttermost 
fraction  of  a  calculable  and  incalculable  value,  we  have,  each 
one  of  us,  to  settle  the  exact  balance  in  the  above-said  Sav- 
ings-bank, or  official  register  kept  by  Nature:  Creditor  by 
the  quantity  of  veracities  we  have  done.  Debtor  by  the  quan- 
tity of  falsities  and  errors;  there  is  not,  by  any  conceivable 
device,  the  faintest  hope  of  escape  from  that  issue  for  one 
of  us,   nor  for  all  of  us." 

""Latter-Day  Pamphlets,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  VoL 
II.,  p.  449. 


52  EDUCATION 

The  most  commanding  illustration  of  the  effect 
of  training  in  sincerity  to  be  found  in  Carlyle's 
works  is  Frederick  the  Great. 

It  is  an  excellent  symptom  of  his  intellect,  this  of  gravi- 
tating irresistibly  towards  realities.  Better  symptom  of  its 
quality  (whatever  quantity  there  be  of  it),  human  intellect 
cannot  show  for  itself.  However  it  may  go  with  Literature, 
and  satisfaction  to  readers  of  romantic  appetites,  this  young 
soul  promises  to  become  a  successful  Worker  one  day,  and  to 
do  something  under  the  Sun.  For  work  is  of  an  extremely 
unfictitious  nature ;  and  no  man  can  roof  his  house  with  clouds 
and  moonshine,  so  as  to  turn  the  rain  from  him.^' 

The  vital  place  of  sincerity  as  a  single  virtue  is 
bespoken  in  Carlyle's  praise  of  work.  Diligence 
and  honesty  are  to  him  twin  sisters ;  each  promotes 
the  welfare  of  the  other.  If  one  great  idea  be 
more  prominent  than  another  in  Carlyle,  it  is  the 
idea  of  the  worthiness  of  work.  In  the  essay  on 
*■ '  Chartism ' '  he  says : 

Work  is  the  mission  of  man  in  this  Earth.  A  day  is  ever 
struggling  forward,  a  day  will  arrive  in  some  approximate 
degree,  when  he  who  has  no  work  to  do,  by  whatever  name 
he  may  be  named,  will  not  find  it  good  to  show  himself  in 
our  quarter  of  the  Solar  System;  but  may  go  and  look  out 
elsewhere.  If  there  be  any  Idle  Planet  discoverable  ? — Let  the 
honest  working  man  rejoice  that  such  law,  the  first  of  Nature, 

"  *  *  Frederick  the  Great, ' '  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  VoL  V., 
p.  420. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLB  53 

has  been  made  good  on  him;  and  hope  that,  by  and  by,  all 
elie  will  be  made  good.     It  is  the  beginning  of  all.^^ 

And  also  in  the  essay  on  **The  Nigger  Question'* : 

This  is  the  everlasting  duty  of  all  men,  black  or  white,  who 
are  bom  into  this  world.  To  do  comipetent  work,  to  labor 
honestly  according  to  the  ability  given  them ;  for  that  and  for 
no  other  purpose  was  each  one  of  us  sent  into  this  world; 
and  woe  is  to  every  man  who,  by  friend  or  by  foe,  is  pre- 
vented from  fulfilling  this  the  end  of  his  being." 

In  the  essay  **Past  and  Present"  Carlyle  de- 
clares : 

All  work,  even  cotton-spinning,  is  noble;  work  is  alone 
noble:  be  that  here  said  and  asserted  once  more.  And  in 
like  manner,  too,  all  dignity  is  painful;  a  life  of  ease  is 
not  for  any  man,  nor  for  any  god.  The  life  of  all  gods  figures 
itself  to  us  as  a  Sublime  Sadness,— earnestness  of  Infinite 
Battle  against  Infinite  Labor.^' 

And  also  in  the  same  chapter  he  observes : 

The  only  happiness  a  brave  man  ever  troubled  himself 
with  asking  much  about  was,  happiness  enough  to  get  his 
work  done.  Not  "I  can't  eat!"  but  "I  can't  work!"  that 
was  the  burden  of  all  wise  complaining  among  men.  It  is, 
after  all,  the  one  unhappiness  of  a  man.     That  he  cannot 

*"* Chartism,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  VoL  XVI.,  p.  50. 

""The  Nigger  Question,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Ibid., 
p.  299. 

""Past  and  Present,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  VoL  XIL, 
p.  149. 


54  EDUCATION 

work ;  that  he  cannot  get  his  destiny  as  a  man  fulfilled.  Be- 
hold, the  day  is  passing  swiftly  over,  our  life  is  passing  swiftly 
over ;  and  the  night  cometh,  wherein  no  man  can  work.^'^ 

Further  he  interprets : 

The  spoken  Word,  the  written  Poem,  is  said  to  be  an  epit- 
ome of  the  man;  how  much  more  the  done  Work.  What- 
soever of  morality  and  of  intelligence ;  what  of  patience,  per- 
severance, faithfulness,  of  method,  insight,  ingenuity,  energy ; 
in  a  word,  whatsoever  of  Strength  the  man  had  in  him  will 
lie  written  in  the  Work  he  does.  To  work :  why,  it  is  to  try 
himself  against  Nature,  and  her  everlasting  unerring  Laws; 
these  will  tell  a  true  verdict  as  to  the  man,^^ 

In  the  chapter  in  ''Past  and  Present"  devoted  to 
labor,  Carlyle  proclaims  again : 

For  there  is  a  perennial  nobleness,  and  even  sacredness, 
in  Work,  Were  he  never  so  benighted,  forgetful  of  his  high 
calling,  there  is  always  hope  in  a  man  that  actually  and  ear- 
nestly works:  in  Idleness  alone  is  there  perpetual  despair. 
Work,  never  so  mammonish,  mean,  is  in  communication  with 
Nature ;  the  real  desire  to  get  Work  done  will  itself  lead  one 
more  and  more  to  truth,  to  Nature's  appointments  and  regu- 
lations, which  are  truth. 

The  latest  Gospel  in  this  world  is.  Know  thy  work  and 
do  it.  ''Know  thyself:"  long  enough  has  that  poor  "self" 
of  thine  tormented  thee;  thou  wilt  never  get  to  "know"  it, 
I  believe!  Think  it  not  thy  business,  this  of  knowing  thy- 
self; thou  art  an  unknowable  individual:    know  what  thou 

"  Ibid.,  p.  152. 
"76id.,  p.  154. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  55 

canst  work  at;  and  work  at  it,  like  a  Hercules!     That  will 
be  thy  better  plan. 

It  has  been  written,  "an  endleas  significance  lies  in  Work;" 
a  man  perfects  himself  by  working.  Foul  jungles  are  cleared 
away,  fair  seedfields  rise  instead,  and  stately  cities;  and 
withal  the  man  himscL  first  ceases  to  be  a  jungle  and  foul 
unwholesome  desert  thereby.  Consider  how,  even  in  the 
meanest  sorts  of  Labor,  the  whole  soul  of  a  man  is  com- 
posed into  a  kind  of  real  harmony,  the  instant  he  sets  himself 
to  work!  Doubt,  Desire,  Sorrow,  Remorse,  Indignation,  De- 
spair itself,  all  these  like  hell-dogs  lie  beleaguering  the  soul 
of  the  poor  day-worker,  as  of  every  man ;  but  he  bends  himself 
with  free  valor  against  his  task,  and  all  these  are  stilled,  all 
these  shrink  murmuring  far  off  into  their  caves.  The  man  is 
now  a  man.  The  blessed  glow  of  labor  in  him,  is  it  not  as 
purifying  fire,  wherein  all  poison  is  burnt  up,  and  of  sour 
smoke  itself  there  is  made  bright  blessed  flame  !*• 

In  the  chapter  in  "Past  and  Present,''  already- 
referred  to,  he  further  says : 

All  true  work  is  sacred ;  in  all  true  Work,  were  it  but  true 
hand-labor,  there  is  something  of  divineness.  Labor,  wide  as 
the  Earth,  has  its  summit  in  Heaven.  Sweat  of  the  brow; 
and  up  from  that  to  sweat  of  the  brain,  sweat  of  the  heart; 
which  includes  all  Kepler  calculations,  Newton  meditations, 
all  Sciences,  all  spoken  Epics,  all  acted  Heroisms,  Martyrdoms, 
— up  to  that  "Agony  of  bloody  sweat,"  which  all  men  have 
called  divine!  O  brother,  if  this  is  not  "worship,"  then  I 
say,  the  more  pity  for  worship;  for  this  is  the  noblest  thing 
yet  discovered  under  God's  sky.     Who  art  thou  that  com- 

"" Labor,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Ibid.,  p.  190. 


56  EDUCATION 

plainest  of  thy  life  of  toil?  Complain  not.  Look  up,  my 
wearied  brother;  see  thy  fellow  Workmen  there,  in  God's 
Eternity ;  surviving  there,  they  alone  surviving ;  sacred  Band 
of  the  Immortals,  celestial  Body-guard  of  the  Empire  of 
Mankind.^" 

Such  is  the  interpretation  of  work  which  this 
great  laborer  gives.  It  is  an  interpretation  re- 
quired in  our  own  age  even  more  fundamentally 
than  in  the  times  in  which  and  of  which  he  wrote. 
For  the  college  man  of  to-day  is  not  laborious.  Less 
laborious  he  is  than  he  was  in  the  days  of  his 
fathers.  He  works  no  more  intensely  in  the  hours 
in  which  he  does  work,  and  the  hours  of  his  labor 
are  fewer.  The  gospel  of  indulgence  abounds.  The 
by-products  of  the  higher  education  have  taken  the 
place  of  the  direct.  The  student  values  less  highly 
the  acquiring  of  mental  power  and  mor^  highly 
the  gaining  of  culture.  The  honors  of  the  class- 
room have  become  less  precious  than  the  honors 
of  the  campus.  The  condition  may  be  painted  in 
colors  too  dark  or  too  bright;  but  that  a  change 
has  occurred  is  evident.  The  time  has  come  indeed 
to  put  the  emphasis  in  our  college  courses  upon 
hard  work ;  and  a  preaching  of  the  gospel  of  Car- 
lyle  is  timely. 

""Past  and  Present,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estea  &  Lauriat,  Ibid., 
p.  195. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  57 

In  Carlyle's  scheme  of  education,  if  it  be  a 
scheme  at  all,  religion,  as  in  his  scheme  of  life,  fills 
a  large  place.  Carlyle  's  religion  is  not  that  of  the 
kirk.  It  has  no  thirty-nine  articles.  Rather  its 
articles  are  only  one,  or  an  infinite  number.  It 
has  a  catechism,  a  long  one,  so  long  as  to  represent 
infinities  and  eternities.  It  has  no  forms — neither 
creed  nor  catechism.  Its  church  is  all  out-of-doors. 
Its  services  are  the  working  of  all  the  powers  of 
nature  and  of  man.  Its  priest  is  the  eternal  and 
universal  force  making  not  for  evil  nor  for  vileness 
nor  for  damnation,  but  for  righteousness,  for  sin- 
cerity, and  for  salvation.  Its  altar  is  work,  and  its 
book  of  common  prayer  the  desire  for  truth  and 
for  power.  Its  saints  are  the  world 's  thinkers  and 
doers,  potent  through  infinite  space  and  eternal 
time.  They  are  indeed  the  elect,  chosen  by  the 
forces  of  divine  movements  and  tendencies.  Car- 
lyle's  religion  rests  in  the  relation  which  man  bears 
to  ultimate  reality.  Its  scope  is  as  much  greater 
than  temporary  concerns  as  eternity  is  longer  than 
time.    It  creates  nations  and  individuals. 

Carlyle  teUs  the  Edinburgh  youth  that 

No  nation  which  did  not  contemplate  this  wonderful  uni- 
verse with  an  awe-stricken  and  reverential  belief  that  there 


58  EDUCATION 

was  a  great  unknown,  omnipotent,  and  all-wise  and  all-just  Be- 
ing, superintending  all  men  in  it,  and  all  interests  in  it, — ^no 
nation  ever  came  to  very  much,  nor  did  any  man  either,  who 
forgot  that.  If  a  man  did  forget  that,  he  forgot  the  most 
im^portant  part  of  his  mission  in  this  world.^^ 

Carlyle  is  willing  to  grant  to  that  form  of  religion 
called  Presbyterianism  a  large  share  in  the  develop- 
ment of  his  native  country. 

Nobody  who  knows  Scotland  and  Scott  can  doubt  but  Pres- 
byterianism too  had  a  vast  share  in  the  forming  of  him.  A 
country  where  the  entire  people  is,  or  even  once  has  been, 
laid  hold  of,  filled  to  the  heart  with  an  infinite  religious  idea, 
has ' '  made  a  step  from  which  it  cannot  retrograde. ' '  Thought, 
conscience,  the  sense  that  man  is  denizen  of  a  Universe,  crea- 
ture of  an  Eternity,  has  penetrated  to  the  remotest  cottage, 
to  the  simplest  heart.  Beautiful  and  awful,  the  feeling  of  a 
Heavenly  Behest,  of  Duty  god-commanded,  over-canopies  all 
life.  There  is  an  inspiration  in  such  a  people;  one  may  say 
in  a  more  special  sense,  "the  inspiration  of  the  Almighty  giv- 
eth  them  understanding, ' '  ^^ 

There  is  also  a  specific  element  of  religion,  which 
our  great  author  commends.  It  is  embodied  in  the 
word  reverence.  He  follows  Goethe  in  giving  a 
high  place  in  the  building  of  character,  to  this  in- 

"  ' '  Inaugural  Address, ' '  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  XVI., 
p.  396. 

""Essay  on  Scott,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  XV., 
p.  419. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  59 

tellectual  and  moral  virtue.    Writing  of  Goethe's 
works  he  says : 

To  enlighten  this  principle  of  reverence  for  the  great,  to 
teach  us  reverence,  and  whom  we  are  to  revere  and  admire, 
should  ever  be  a  chief  aim  of  Education  (indeed  it  is  herein 
that  instruction  properly  both  begins  and  ends) ;  and  in  these 
late  ages,  perhaps  more  than  ever,  so  indispensable  is  now 
our  need  of  clear  reverence,  so  inexpressibly  poor  our  supply. 
"Clear  reverence!"  it  was  once  responded  to  a  seeker  of 
light :  *  *  all  want  it,  perhaps  thou  thyself. ' '  What  wretched 
idols,  of  Leeds  cloth,  stuffed  out  with  bran  of  one  kind  or 
other,  do  men  either  worship,  or  being  tired  of  worshipping 
(so  expensively  without  fruit),  rend  in  pieces  and  kick  out 
of  doors,  amid  loud  shouting  and  crowing,  what  they  call 
"tremendous  cheers,"  as  if  the  feat  were  miraculous!  In 
private  life,  as  in  public,  delusion  in  this  sort  does  its  work; 
the  blind  leading  the  blind,  both  fall  into  the  ditch.''' 

What  method  shall  be  adopted  for  the  teaching 
of  this  fundamental  and  all-embracing  subject  of 
religion  ?  What  method  shall  be  adopted  for  incor- 
porating it  as  a  part  of  education?  That  is  not 
the  question.  Rather  the  question  is:  What 
method  shall  be  adopted  for  teaching  it  as  a  basic 
principle  ?  The  problem  was  given  up  by  Carlyle 
as  one  he  could  not  solve.  The  same  confession  has 
been  made  by  the  wise  and  imwise  since  his  day. 

""Goethe's  Works,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Ibid.,  p.  25. 


60  EDUCATION 

"With  much  negative  declamation  Carlyle  says  that 
others  must  solve  the  problem  out  of  their  own 
experience  and  wisdom.  He  believes  that  from  the 
life  of  the  English  people,  dealing  with  this  ques- 
tion through  the  centuries,  may  come  forth  the 
proper  answer. 

**And  now  how  teach  religion?"  so  asks  the  indignant 
Ultra-radical,  cited  above;  an  Ultra-radical  seemingly  not 
of  the  Benthamee  species,  with  whom,  though  his  dialect  is 
far  different,  there  are  sound  Churchmen,  we  hope,  who  have 
some  fellow-feeling :  ' '  How  teach  religion  ? "  By  plying  with 
liturgies,  catechisms,  credos;  droning  thirty-nine  or  other  ar- 
ticles incessantly  into  the  infant  ear?  Friends!  In  that 
case,  why  not  apply  to  Birmingham,  and  have  Machines  made, 
and  set  up  at  all  street-comers,  in  highways  and  by-ways,  to 
repeat  and  vociferate  the  same,  not  ceasing  night  or  day? 
The  genius  of  Birmingham  is  adequate  to  that.  Albertus 
Magnus  had  a  leather  man  that  could  articulate ;  not  to  speak 
of  Martinus  Scriblerus'  Niirnberg  man  that  could  reason  as 
well  as  we  know  who!  Depend  upon  it,  Birmingham  can 
make  machines  to  repeat  liturgies  and  articles ;  to  do  whatso- 
ever feat  is  mechanical.  And  what  were  all  schoolmasters, 
nay  aU  priests  and  churches,  compared  with  this  Birmingham 
Iron  Church!  Votes  of  two  millions  in  aid  of  the  Church 
were  then  something.  You  order,  at  so  many  pounds  a  head, 
so  many  thousand  iron  parsons  as  your  grant  covers;  and 
fix  them  by  satisfactory  masonry  in  all  quarters  wheresoever 
wanted,  to  preach  there  independent  of  the  world.  In  loud 
thoroughfares,  stiU  more  in  unawakened  districts,  troubled 
with  argumentative  infidelity,  you  make  the  windpipes  wider, 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  61 

strengthen  the  main  steam-cylinder ;  your  parson  preaches,  to 
the  due  pitch,  while  you  give  him  coal;  and  fears  no  man 
or  thing.  Here  were  a  "Church-extension;"  to  which  I,  with 
my  last  penny,  did  I  believe  in  it,  would  subscribe.'* 

Yet,  as  he  intimates,  the  only  way  to  teach  reli- 
gion is  by  experience,  by  acquaintance  with  the 
thing  itself  become  incarnate.  The  method  of 
teaching  religion  is  not  through  religious  persons. 
Writing  of  Frederick  the  Great  he  says  more  fully 
upon  this  point : 

Piety  to  God,  the  nobleness  that  inspires  a  human  soul  to 
struggle  Heavenward,  cannot  be  "taught"  by  the  most  ex- 
quisite catechisms,  or  the  most  industrious  preachings  and 
drillings.  No ;  alas,  no.  Only  by  far  other  methods, — chiefly 
by  silent  continual  Example,  silently  waiting  for  the  favorable 
mood  and  moment,  and  aided  then  by  a  kind  of  miracle,  well 
enough  named  "the  grace  of  God," — can  that  sacred  con- 
tagion pass  from  soul  into  soul.  How  much  beyond  whole 
Libraries  of  orthodox  Theology  is,  sometimes,  the  mute  action, 
the  unconscious  look  of  a  father,  of  a  mother,  who  had  in. 
them  "Devoutness,  pious  Nobleness!"  In  whom  the  young 
soul,  not  unobservant,  though  not  consciously  observing,  came 
at  length  to  recognise  it ;  to  read  it,  in  this  irrefragable  man- 
ner: a  seed  planted  thenceforth  in  the  centre  of  his  holiest 
affections  forevermore ! '" 

»*" Chartism,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  XVI.,  p.  109. 
""'Frederick  the  Great,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat>  VoL  V., 
p.  414. 


62  EDUCATION 

But  in  the  teaching  of  religion,  it  is  fair  to  re- 
mark in  passing,  a  distinction  is  ever  to  be  made 
between  religion  as  a  life  and  religion  as  a  system 
of  truth. 

The  measures  and  methods  for  securing  the  con- 
summate and  comprehensive  result  of  a  man,  wise, 
sincere,  laborious  and  religious,  are  many  and 
diverse.  Interpretations  and  intimations  of  these 
ways  are  scattered  up  and  down  these  thousands 
of  pages.  Among  the  first  of  them  all  we  find  the 
art  of  teaching  itself.  Teaching  in  its  highest  rela- 
tionship is  of  greatest  value  in  making  the  man. 
In  teaching,  the  teacher  is  of  primary  importance. 
There  are  teachers,  and  there  are  teachers.  In  his 
autobiographic  essay  Carlyle  speaks  of  teachers 
who  are  not  indeed  teachers. 

My  teachers  were  hide-bound  Pedants,  without  knowl- 
edge of  man's  nature,  or  of  boy's;  or  of  aught  save 
their  lexicons  and  quarterly  account-books.  Innumerable 
dead  Vocables  (no  dead  Language,  for  they  themselves  knew 
no  Language)  they  crammed  into  us,  and  called  it  fostering 
the  growth  of  mind.  How  can  an  inanimate,  mechanical 
Gerund-grinder,  the  like  of  whom  will,  in  a  subsequent  cen- 
tury, be  manufactured,  at  Niirnberg  out  of  wood  and  leather, 
foster  the  growth  of  anything;  much  more  of  Mind,  which 
grows,  not  like  a  vegetable  (by  having  its  roots  littered  with 
etymological  compost),  but  like  a  spirit,  by  mysterious  con- 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  63 

tact  of  Spirit;  Thought  kindling  itself  at  the  fire  of  living 
Thought?  How  shall  he  give  kindling,  in  whose  own  inward 
man  there  is  no  live  coal,  but  all  is  burnt  out  to  a  dead  gram- 
matical cinder?  The  Ilinterschlag  Professors  knew  syntax 
enough ;  and  of  the  human  soul  thus  much :  that  it  had 
a  faculty  called  Memory,  and  could  be  acted  on  through  the 
muscular  integument  by  appliance  of  birch-rods.^' 

Yet  there  is  another  kind  of  teacher,  of  which 
Diderot  is  the  type.  In  his  sketch  of  the  great 
Frenchman,  Carlyle,  speaking  of  Diderot's  teach- 
ing, says: 

To  decipher  the  talent  of  a  young  vague  Capability,  who 
must  one  day  be  a  man  and  a  Reality;  to  take  him  by  the 
hand,  and  train  him  to  a  spiritual  trade,  and  set  him  up  in 
it,  with  tools,  shop  and  good-will,  were  doing  him  in  most 
cases  an  unspeakable  service, — on  this  one  proviso,  it  is  true, 
that  the  trade  be  a  just  and  honest  one;  in  which  proviso 
surely  there  should  lie  no  hindrance  to  such  service,  but 
rather  a  help.*^ 

To  secure  the  noblest  results  there  must  be  in  the 
teacher  at  least  two  qualities  beside  the  quality 
of  intelligence  or  the  element  of  intellect.  The  first 
is  a  sense  of  reality.  The  sense  of  reality  is  the 
reagent  of  sincerity.    This  sense  the  teacher  must 

*• '  *  Sartor  Resartus, ' '  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  I.,  p.  81. 
""Essay  on  Diderot,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  XV., 
p.  93. 


64  EDUCATION 

possess.    In  writing  of  Frederick  and  of  his  educa- 
tion, Carlyle  says: 

Fritz  had  one  unspeakable  advantage,  rare  among  princes 
and  even  a^-iong  peasants  in  these  ruined  ages:  that  of  not 
being  taught,  or  in  general  not,  by  the  kind  called  "Hypo- 
crites, and  even  Sincere-Hypocrites," — fatalest  species  of  the 
class  Hypocrite.  We  perceive  he  was  lessoned,  all  along,  not 
by  enchanted  Phantasms  of  that  dangerous  sort,  breathing 
mendacity  of  mind,  unconsciously,  out  of  every  look;  but  by 
real  Men,  who  believed  from  the  heart  outwards,  and  were 
daily  doing  what  they  taught.  To  which  unspeakable  ad- 
vantage we  add  a  second,  likewise  considerable:  That  his 
masters,  though  rigorous,  were  not  unlovable  to  him; — that 
his  affections,  at  least,  were  kept  alive ;  that  whatever  of  seed 
(or  of  chaff  and  hail,  as  was  likelier)  fell  on  his  mind,  had 
sunshine  to  help  in  dealiag  with  it.^* 

Thus  the  second  attribute  which  the  teacher 
should  possess  is  affection.  He  may  well  be  severe, 
but  in  his  severity  there  should  be  the  element  of 
love.  Light  he  is  to  give,  but  the  light  should  come 
from  the  heart  quite  as  much  as  from  the  intellect. 
In  that  beautiful  essay  entitled  "Death  of  Goethe,  '^ 
Carlyle  says : 

Precious  is  the  new  light  of  Knowledge  which  our  Teacher 
conquers  for  us;  yet  small  to  the  new  light  of  Love  which 
also  we  derive  from  him:    the  most  important  element  of 

*•" Frederick  the  Great,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol. 
v.,  p.  376. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  65 

any  man's  performance  is  the  Life  he  has  accomplished. 
Under  the  intellectual  union  of  man  and  man,  which  works 
by  precept,  lies  a  holier  union  of  affection,  working  by  ex- 
ample; the  influences  of  which  latter,  mystic,  deep-reaching, 
all-embracing,  can  still  less  be  computed.  For  Love  is  ever 
the  beginning  of  Knowledge,  as  fire  is  of  light;  and  works  also 
more  in  the  manner  of  fire.'* 

This  method  of  education  through  the  teacher 
who  is  sincere  and  kind  is  on  the  whole  to  be  pre- 
ferred to  the  method  which  is  referred  to  in  "  Sartor 
Resartus,"  the  method  of  ** reading  up.'' 

Teuf elsdrockh  affirms,  in  jest : 

**I  have  heard  affirmed  (surely  in  jest),**  observes  he  else- 
where, "by  not  unphilanthropic  persons,  that  it  were  a  real 
increase  of  human  happiness,  could  all  young  men  from  the 
age  of  nineteen  be  covered  under  barrels,  or  rendered  other- 
wise invisible;  and  there  left  to  follow  their  lawful  studies 
and  callings,  till  they  emerged,  sadder  and  wiser,  at  the  age 
of  twenty-five.  With  which  suggestion,  at  least  as  considered 
in  the  light  of  a  practical  scheme,  I  need  scarcely  say  that 
I  nowise  coincide.  Nevertheless  it  is  plausibly  urged  that, 
as  young  ladies  (Mddchen)  are,  to  mankind,  precisely  the 
most  delightful  in  those  years;  so  young  gentlemen  {Biihchen) 
do  then  attain  their  maximum  of  detestability.  Such  gawks 
(Gecken)  are  they,  and  foolish  peacocks,  and  yet  with  such 
a  vulturous  hunger  for  self-indulgence ;  so  obstinate,  obstrep- 

»" Death  of  Goethe,"  Edition  do  Luxe,  Eateg  &  Lauriat,  VoL  XV., 
p.  13. 


66  EDUCATION 

erous,  vain-glorious;  in  all  senses,  so  fro  ward  and  so  for- 
ward. .  .  ."3'> 

Of  the  specific  studies  which  youth  may  pursue 
Carlyle  has  little  to  say.  Negatively  he  spurns  the 
two  extremes,  science  and  logic.  For  these  Teuf  els- 
drockh  has  no  use. 

"Shall  your  Science,"  exclaims  he,  "proceed  in  the  small 
chink-lighted,  or  even  oil-lighted,  underground  workshop  of 
Logic  alone;  and  man's  mind  become  an  Arithmetical  Mill, 
whereof  Memory  is  the  Hopper,  and  mere  Tables  of  Sines 
and  Tangents,  Codification,  and  Treatises  of  what  you  call 
Political  Economy,  are  the  Meal?  And  what  is  that  Science, 
which  the  scientific  head  alone,  were  it  screwed  off,  and  (like 
the  Doctor's  in  the  Arabian  Tale)  set  in  a  basin  to  keep  it 
alive,  could  prosecute  without  shadow  of  a  heart, — ^but  one 
other  of  the  mechanical  and  menial  handicrafts,  for  which 
the  Scientific  Head  (having  a  Soul  in  it)  is  too  noble  an 
organ?  I  mean  that  Thought  without  Reverence  is  barren, 
perhaps  poisonous ;  at  best,  dies  like  cookery  with  the  day  that 
called  it  forth ;  does  not  live,  like  sowing,  in  successive  tilths 
and  wider-spreading  harvests,  bringing  food  and  plenteous 
increase  to  all  Time."  " 

But  for  history  as  a  study  in  the  university  his 
enthusiasm  is  great.  No  wonder  that  it  is  great! 
He  tells  the  Edinburgh  students,  in  the  **  Inaugural 
Address:" 

■"'Sartor  Resartus,'*  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  L,  p.  98. 
"/6id.,  p.  52. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  67 

As  applicable  to  all  of  you,  I  will  say  that  it  is  highly  ex- 
pedient to  go  into  History;  to  inquire  into  what  has  passed 
before  you  on  this  Earth,  and  in  the  Family  of  Man." 

At  greater  length  too,  in  a  fragment  of  earlier 
writing,  he  says: 

History  recommends  itself  as  the  most  profitable  of  all 
studies:  and  truly,  for  such  a  being  as  Man,  who  is  born, 
and  has  to  learn  and  work,  and  then  after  a  measured  term 
of  years  to  depart,  leaving  descendants  and  performances, 
and  so,  in  all  ways,  to  vindicate  himself  as  vital  portion  of  a 
Mankind,  no  study  could  be  fitter.  History  is  the  Letter  of  In- 
structions, which  the  old  generations  write  and  posthumously 
transmit  to  the  new;  nay  it  may  be  called,  more  generally 
still,  the  Message,  verbal  or  written,  which  all  Mankind  de- 
livers to  every  man;  it  is  the  only  articulate  communication 
(when  the  inarticulate  and  mute,  intelligible  or  not,  he  round 
us  and  in  us,  so  strangely  through  every  fibre  of  our  being, 
every  step  of  our  activity)  which  the  Past  can  have  with  the 
Present,  the  Distant  with  what  is  Here.  All  Books,  there- 
fore, were  they  but  Song-books  or  treatises  on  Mathematics, 
are  in  the  long-run  historical  documents — as  indeed  all  Speech 
itself  is:  thus  we  might  say,  History  is  not  only  the  fittest 
study,  but  the  only  study,  and  includes  all  others  whatsoever. 
The  Perfect  in  History,  he  who  understood,  and  saw  and 
knew  within  himself,  all  that  the  whole  Family  of  Adam  had 
hitherto  been  and  hitherto  done,  were  perfect  in  all  learning 
extant  or  possible ;  needed  not  thenceforth  to  study  any  more ; 
had  thenceforth  nothing  left  but  to  he  and  to  do  something 

" '  *  Inaugural  Address, ' '  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lariat,  VoL  XVL, 
p.  394. 


68  EDUCATION 

himself,  that  others  might  make  History  of  it,  and  learn 
of  him,^^ 

Into  the  large  field  embraced  in  the  course  of 
study  of  the  modern  university  Carlyle  does  not 
enter.  He  was  concerned  with  the  sciences  as 
applied  to  nations  and  to  men,  but  with  the  sciences 
as  a  tool  of  teaching  and  of  forming  character  he 
had  nothing  to  do.  With  government — its  methods 
and  its  forms — ^with  sociology — its  atmospheres  and 
forces — ^he  also  was  concerned  as  human  forces, 
but  with  them  as  with  formal  disciplines  he  had 
nothing  to  do  and  concerning  them  no  statement 
to  make.  Of  biology,  geology  or  other  sciences,  of 
national  literatures  and  languages,  he  likewise  had 
nothing  to  say.  But  of  course  it  is  to  be  remem- 
bered that  Carlyle  does  not  write  as  the  pedagogue 
or  educational  philosopher. 

Man  is,  furthermore,  educated  by  his  associates, 
his  fellow  students.  The  acquisitions  and  the  atti- 
tudes of  academic  life  train  him  into  symmetry 
and  efficiency.    Writing  of  Scott,  Carlyle  says : 

No  man  lives  without  jostling  and  being  jostled ;  in  all  ways 
he  has  to  elbow  himself  through  the  world,  giving  and  receiv- 
ing offence.    His  life  is  a  battle,  in  so  far  as  it  is  an  entity  at 

""Essay  on  History,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  VoL  XV., 
p.  74. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  69 

all.  The  very  oyster,  we  suppose,  comes  in  collision  with 
oysters:  undoubtedly  enough  it  does  come  in  collision  with 
Necessity  and  Difficulty;  and  helps  itself  through,  not  as 
a  perfect  ideal  oyster,  but  as  an  imperfect  real  one.  Some 
kind  of  remorse  must  be  known  to  the  oyster :  certain  hatreds, 
certain  pusillanimities.'* 

Writing  of  his  beloved  John  Sterling  he  inter- 
prets thus : 

But  here,  as  in  his  former  schools,  his  studies  and  inquiries, 
diligently  prosecuted  I  believe,  were  of  the  most  discursive 
wide-flowing  character;  not  steadily  advancing  along  beaten 
roads  towards  College  honors,  but  pulsing  out  with  impetu- 
ous irregularity  now  on  this  tract,  now  on  that,  towards 
whatever  spiritual  Delphi  might  promise  to  unfold  the  mys- 
tery of  this  world,  and  announce  to  him  what  was,  in  our 
new  day,  the  authentic  message  of  the  gods.  His  speculations, 
readings,  inferences,  glances  and  conclusions  were  doubtless 
sufficiently  encyclopedic;  his  grand  tutors  the  multifarious 
set  of  Books  he  devoured.  And  perhaps, — as  is  the  singular 
case  in  most  schools  and  educational  establishments  of  this 
unexampled  epoch, — it  was  not  the  express  set  of  arrange- 
ments in  this  or  any  extant  University  that  could  essentially 
forward  him,  but  only  the  implied  and  silent  ones;  less  in 
the  prescribed  "course  of  study,"  which  seems  to  tend  no- 
whither,  than — if  you  will  consider  it — in  the  generous  (not 
ungenerous)  rebellion  against  said  prescribed  course,  and 
the  voluntary  spirit  of  endeavor  and  adventure  excited  there- 
by, does  help  lie  for  a  brave  youth  in  such  places.  Curious  to 
consider.     The  fagging,  the  illicit  boating,  and  the  things 

** ' '  Essay  on  Scott, ' '  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Ibid.,  p.  407. 


70  EDUCATION 

forbidden  by  the  school-master, — ^these,  I  often  notice  in  my 
Eton  acquaintances,  are  the  things  that  have  done  them 
good;  these,  and  not  their  inconsiderable  or  considerable 
knowledge  of  the  Greek  accidence  almost  at  all!  What  is 
Greek  accidence,  compared  to  Spartan  discipline,  if  it  can 
be  had?  That  latter  is  a  real  and  grand  attainment.  Cer- 
tainly, if  rebellion  is  unfortunately  needful,  and  you  can 
rebel  in  a  generous  manner,  several  things  may  be  acquired 
in  that  operation, — rigorous  mutual  fidelity,  reticence,  stead- 
fastness, mild  stoicism,  and  other  virtues  far  transcending 
your  Greek  accidence.  Nor  can  the  unwisest  "prescribed 
course  of  study ' '  be  considered  quite  useless,  if  it  have  incited 
you  to  try  nobly  on  all  sides  for  a  course  of  your  own.  A 
singular  condition  of  Schools  and  High-schools,  which  have 
come  down,  in  their  strange  old  clothes  and  "courses  of 
study,"  from  the  monkish  ages  into  this  highly  unmonkish 
one; — tragical  condition,  at  which  the  intelligent  observer 
makes  deep  pause !  ^^ 

In  "Latter-Day  Pamphlets"  too,  writing  of  the 
stump-orator,  Carlyle  says: 

Especially  where  many  men  work  together,  the  very  rub- 
bing against  one  another  will  grind  and  polish  off  their  angu- 
larities into  roundness,  into  "politeness"  after  a  sort;  and 
the  official  man,  place  him  how  you  may,  will  never  want  for 
schooling,  of  extremely  various  kinds.  A  first-rate  school  one 
cannot  call  this  Parliament  for  him ; — I  fear  to  say  what  rate 
at  present!    In  so  far  as  it  teaches  him  vigilance,  patience, 

""John  Sterling,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  II.,  p.  34. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  71 

courage,  toughness  of  lungs  or  of  soul,  and  skill  in  any  kind 
of  swimming,  it  is  a  good  school." 

Now  the  result  of  all  this  education  through  home 
and  school  and  university,  in  morals  and  religion, 
in  honor  and  honesty,  by  teacher  and  fellow-stu- 
dent, is  what?  What  is  the  purpose  realized? 
What  is  the  achievement,  what  is  the  accomplish- 
ment through  the  years  and  all  the  chaos  of  time 
and  labor,  of  watchfulness  and  sacrifice,  of  pain 
and  pleasure  ?  The  result  is  the  transformation  of 
chaos  into  cosmos.  As  Carlyle  says  in  writing  of 
Frederick  and  of  Frederick's  education: 

To  make  of  the  human  soul  a  Cosmos,  so  far  as  possible,  that 
was  Friedrich  Wilhelm's  dumb  notion:  not  to  leave  the  hu- 
man soul  a  mere  Chaos; — how  much  less  a  Singing  or  elo- 
quently Spouting  Chaos,  which  is  ten  times  worse  than  a 
Chaos  left  mute,  confessedly  chaotic  and  not  cosmic!  To 
develop  the  man  into  doing  something ;  and  withal  into  doing 
it  as  the  Universe  and  the  Eternal  Laws  require, — which  is  but 
another  name  for  really  doing  and  not  merely  seeming  to  do 
it: — that  was  Friedrich  Wilhelm's  dumb  notion:  and  it  was, 
I  can  assure  you,  very  far  from  being  a  foolish  one,  though 
there  was  no  Latin  in  it,  and  much  of  Prussian  pipe-clay !  ^^ 

•• ' '  Latter-Day  Pamphlets, ' '  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Ibid., 
p.  442. 

"  ' '  Frederick  the  Great, ' '  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  V., 
p.  423. 


72  EDUCATION 

The  result  in  its  brief  form  is  **just  vision  to 
discern,  with  free  force  to  do."  ^^ 

In  general  and  stated  at  greater  length  the  result 
is: 

A  man  all  lucid,  and  in  equilibrium.  His  intellect  a  clear 
mirror  geometrically  plane,  brilliantly  sensitive  to  all  ob- 
jects and  impressions  made  on  it,  and  imaging  all  things 
in  their  correct  proportions;  not  twisted  up  into  convex  or 
concave,  and  distorting  everything,  so  that  he  cannot  see  the 
truth  of  the  matter  without  endless  groping  and  manipula- 
tion: healthy,  clear  and  free,  and  discerning  truly  all 
round  him.^® 

At  the  end  of  his  term  of  service  as  rector  of  the 
University  of  Edinburgh,  Carlyle  was  asked  to  de- 
liver a  valedictory  address.  In  his  acknowledg- 
ment of  the  invitation,  which  is  a  benediction,  he 
says: 

Bid  them,  in  my  name,  if  they  still  love  me,  fight  the 
good  fight,  and  quit  themselves  like  men,  in  the  warfare  to 
which  they  are  as  if  conscript  and  consecrated,  and  which 
lies  ahead.  TeU  them  to  consult  the  eternal  oracles  (not 
yet  inaudible,  nor  ever  to  become  so,  when  worthily  in- 
quired of) ;  and  to  disregard,  nearly  altogether,  in  compari- 
son, the  temporary  noises,  menacings  and  deliriums.     May 

*  "Corn-Law  Ehymes, "  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Vol.  XVI., 
p.  126. 

*"* Inaugural  Address,"  Edition  de  Luxe,  Estes  &  Lauriat,  Ibid., 
p.  416. 


ACCORDING  TO  CARLYLE  73 

they  love  Wisdom  as  Wisdom,  if  she  is  to  yield  her  treasures, 
must  be  loved, — piously,  valiantly,  humbly,  beyond  life  it- 
self or  the  prizes  of  life,  with  all  one's  heart,  and  all  one's 
soul: — in  that  case  (I  will  say  again),  and  not  in  any  other 
case,  it  shall  be  well  with  them.*" 

Carlyle's  note  of  farewell,  a  worthy  summary 
of  all  his  teaching,  is  a  bugle  note  of  inspiration 
to  the  student  and  to  the  world. 

''Ibid.,  p.  419. 


ni 

EDUCATION'  ACCOEDING  TO  RUSKIN 

1LAY  down  the  last  of  the  twenty-six  volumes 
of  Ruskin  with  a  heart  at  once  ill  at  ease  and 
exultant.  Ill  at  ease  it  is  because  of  the  sadnesses 
of  his  life,  sadnesses  born  of  himself  and  also  of  his 
dissatisfaction  with  his  times;  exultant  because 
here  is  a  man  who  tried,  like  Sir  Henry  Lawrence, 
to  do  his  duty,  to  see  straight  and  to  think  clearly, 
who  despised  cant  and  meanness,  who  in  his  unflag- 
ging courage  spoke  the  thought  that  was  in  him  and 
incarnated  his  own  creed.  His  times  were  out  of 
joint.  He  wanted  to  set  them  right  and  they  did 
not  care  to  be  set  right.  He,  in  later  years,  spurned 
some  important  doctrines  of  his  earlier.  Rich  for 
his  wants,  he  made  himself  poor  on  his  own  land. 
An  individualist  in  his  theories  of  human  develop- 
ment, an  aristocrat  and  an  autocrat,  he  was  to  a 
large  extent  in  his  use  of  his  property  a  communist. 
A  great  interpreter  of  art,  he  became  a  great  inter- 
preter of  life.  Whether  his  theories  of  art,  of 
political  economy,  of  social  science,  of  government, 

74 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  75 

be  true  or  false — and  many  are  certainly  false — 
he  believed  them  to  be  true  and  greatly  sacrificed 
for  them. 

The  interpretations  which  Ruskin  gives  of  educa- 
tion are  manifold,  diverse,  inconsistent,  having 
their  origin  in  a  variety  of  causes  and  conditions. 
His  remarks  refer  quite  entirely  to  education  as  it 
belongs  to  England.  Down  to  the  passage  of  the 
Education  Bill  of  1870  there  was  no  public  educa- 
tion in  England.  Education  was  largely  a  matter 
either  of  private  instruction  or  of  church  support 
and  control.  The  renaissance  in  education  which 
began  in  Prussia  under  William  von  Hmnboldt 
near  the  close  of  the  Napoleonic  wars  still  awaits 
its  co-ordinate  quickening  among  the  English  peo- 
ple. For  the  English  people  have  never,  until  re- 
cent years,  taken  any  proper  interest  in  this  great- 
est form  of  human  endeavor.  In  the  half -century 
in  which  Ruskin  worked  and  wrote  that  interest  was 
still  torpid.  This  lack  of  interest  arose  and  still 
arises  from  certain  great  social  conditions.  The  rise 
of  the  political  democracy  has  been  the  cause  of  the 
growth  of  the  attention  paid  to  the  education  of 
the  people.  Therefore,  in  his  view,  judging  by 
the  education  with  which  he  was  more  familiar, 
most  of  the  attempts  made  were  conceived  in  unrea- 


76  EDUCATION 

son  and  carried  out  in  unwisdom.  For  many  of 
these  endeavors  Mr.  Ruskin  had  either  scorn  or 
contempt  and  to  others  he  was  indifferent. 

It  is  taken  for  granted  that  any  education  must  be  good ; 
— that  the  more  of  it  we  get,  the  better;  that  bad  education 
only  means  little  education;  and  that  the  worst  thing  we 
have  to  fear  is  getting  none.  Alas,  that  is  not  at  all  so. 
Getting  no  education  is  by  no  means  the  worst  thing  that 
can  happen  to  us.  One  of  the  pleasantest  friends  I  ever 
had  in  my  life  was  a  Savoyard  guide,  who  could  only  read 
with  difficulty,  and  write,  scarcely  intelligibly,  and  by  great 
effort.  He  knew  no  language  but  his  own — no  science,  except 
as  much  practical  agriculture  as  served  him  to  till  his  fields. 
But  he  was,  without  exception,  one  of  the  happiest  persons, 
and,  on  the  whole,  one  of  the  best,  I  have  ever  known.  .  .  .^ 

Positively  Mr.  Ruskin  has  sung  of  the  evil  of 
perverted  education  in  the  poem  on  Christ  Church, 
Oxford.  Addressing  rooms  with  which  he  was  most 
familiar,  he  says : 

Ye  melancholy  chambers !    I  could  shun 

The  darkness  of  your  silence,  with  such  fear. 

As  places  where  slow  murder  had  been  done. 

How  many  noble  spirits  have  died  here, 

Withering  away  in  yearnings  to  aspire. 

Gnawed  by  mocked  hope — devoured  by  their  own  fire! 

Methinks  the  grave  must  feel  a  colder  bed 

To  spirits  such  as  these,  than  unto  common  dead.^ 

* ' '  Fors  Clavigera, ' '  Vol,  I.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  42. 
' ' '  Poetry  of  Architecture, ' '  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  192. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  77 

With  a  sarcasm  which  has  a  touch  of  bitterness 
he  refers  also  to  the  evils  of  the  contemporary  sys- 
tem of  education.  He  says  that  modern  education 
consists  in  getting : 

A  rascal  of  an  architect  to  order  a  rascal  of  a  clcrk-of-the- 
works  to  order  a  parcel  of  rascally  bricklayers  to  build  you 
a  bestially  stupid  building  in  the  middle  of  the  town,  poi- 
soned with  gas,  and  with  an  iron  floor  which  will  drop  you 
all  through  it  some  frosty  evening;  wherein  you  will  bring 
a  puppet  of  a  cockney  lecturer  in  a  dress  coat  and  a  white 
tie,  to  tell  you  smuggly  there 's  no  God,  and  how  many  messes 
he  can  make  of  a  lump  of  sugar.  Much  the  better  you  are 
for  all  that,  when  you  get  home  again,  aren  't  you  ? ' 

With  greater  fullness,  writing  so  late  as  the  year 
1883,  in  the  ninety-fourth  Letter  of  Fors,  he  says : 

And  I  do  not  choose  to  teach  (as  usually  understood)  the 
three  R's;  first,  because,  as  I  do  choose  to  teach  the  elements 
of  music,  astronomy,  botany  and  zoology,  not  only  the  mis- 
tresses and  masters  capable  of  teaching  these  should  not  waste 
their  time  on  the  three  R's ;  but  the  children  themselves  would 
have  no  time  to  spare,  nor  should  they  have.  If  their  fathers 
and  mothers  can  read  and  count,  they  are  the  people  to  teach 
reading  and  numbering,  to  earliest  intelligent  infancy.  For 
orphans,  or  children  whose  fathers  and  mothers  can't  read 
Or  count,  dame  schools  in  every  village  (best  in  the  alms- 
houses, where  there  might  be  dames  enow)  are  all  that  is 
wanted. 

•"Fora  Clavigera,"  Vol.  III.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co., 
p.  416. 


78  EDUCATION 

Secondly.  I  do  not  care  that  St.  George's  children,  as  a 
rule,  should  learn  either  reading  or  writing,  because  there 
are  very  few  people  in  this  world  who  get  any  good  by 
either.  Broadly  and  practically,  whatever  foolish  people 
read  does  them  harm,  and  whatever  they  write,  does  other 
people  harm:  (see  my  notes  on  Narrs  in  general,  and  my 
own  Narr  friend  in  particular,  Fors,  vol.  ii.,  page  400),  and 
nothing  can  ever  prevent  this,  for  a  fool  attracts  folly  as 
decayed  meat  attracts  flies,  and  distils  and  assimilates  it, 
no  matter  out  of  what  book ; — ^he  can  get  as  much  out  of  the 
Bible  as  any  other,  though  of  course  he  or  she  usually  reads 
only  newspaper  or  novel.* 

Again, 

Not  only  do  the  arts  of  literature  and  arithmetic  continu- 
ally hinder  children  in  the  acquisition  of  ideas, — but  they  are 
apt  greatly  to  confuse  and  encumber  the  memory  of  them.° 

Also, 

But,  lastly  and  chiefly,  the  personal  conceit  and  ambition 
developed  by  reading,  in  minds  of  selfish  activity,  lead  to  the 
disdain  of  manual  labor,  and  the  desire  of  all  sorts  of  unat- 
tainable things,  and  fill  the  streets  with  discontented  and  use- 
less persons,  seeking  some  means  of  living  in  town  society 
by  their  wits.  I  need  not  enlarge  on  this  head ;  every  read- 
er's experience  must  avow  the  extent  and  increasing  plague 
of  this  fermenting  imbecility,  striving  to  make  for  itself  what 
it  calls  a  '  *  position  in  life. ' '  * 

*  IMd.,  Vol.  IV.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  365. 
*Ibid.,  p.  368. 
•Ibid.,  p.  369. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  79 

The  simple  truth  is  that  education  represents  a 
discipline  which  humanity  needs  and  does  not  want. 
The  application  of  education,  therefore,  should  be 
addressed  first  to  the  desires  and  not  to  the  intel- 
lect. We  should  discipline  the  passions  and  direct 
them.    The  difficulty  of  this  attempt  is  great,  for 

most  men's  minds  are  indeed  little  better  than  rough  heath 
wilderness,  neglected  and  stubborn,  partly  barren,  partly 
overgrown  with  pestilent  brakes  and  venomous  wind-sown 
herbage  of  evil  surmise;  that  the  first  thing  you  have  to  do 
for  them,  and  yourself,  is  eagerly  and  scornfully  to  set  fire  to 
this;  burn  all  the  jungle  into  wholesome  ash  heaps,  and  then 
plow  and  sow.  All  the  true  literary  work  before  you,  for 
life,  must  begin  with  obedience  to  that  order,  "Break  up 
your  fallow  ground,  and  sow  not  among  thorns."'' 

The  education  which  is  thus  applied  to  hiunanity 
has  many  characteristics,  elements  and  qualities. 
Its  principle — and  the  principle  determines  meth- 
ods and  means  and  measures — has  relation  to  the 
great  law  of  heredity,  for,  as  Mr.  Ruskin  says  in 
the  last  volume  of  *' Modem  Painters:" 

The  lower  orders,  and  all  orders,  have  to  learn  that  every 
vicious  habit  and  chronic  disease  communicates  itself  by  de- 
scent; and  that  by  purity  of  birth  the  entire  system  of  the 
human  body  and  soul  may  be  gradually  elevated,  or  by  reck- 
lessness of  birth,  degraded;  until  there  shall  be  as  much 

*" Sesame  and  Lilies,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  52. 


80  EDUCATION 

difference  between  the  well-bred  and  ill-bred  buman  creature 
(whatever  pains  be  taken  with  their  education)  as  between 
a  wolf-hound  and  the  vilest  mongrel  cur.  And  the  knowl- 
edge of  this  great  fact  ought  to  regulate  the  education  of 
our  youth,  and  the  entire  conduct  of  the  nation.* 

But  under  this  great  law  of  heredity,  a  law  the 
value  of  which  has  become  more  evident  in  the 
fifty  years  since  Mr.  Ruskin  wrote  these  words, 
there  are,  at  least,  three  things  which  the  student  is 
to  learn.    They  are : 

First.    Where  he  is. 

Secondly.     Where  he  is  going. 

Thirdly.    What  he  had  best  do  under  those  circumstances. 

First.  Where  he  is. — That  is  to  say,  what  sort  of  a  world 
he  has  got  into;  how  large  it  is;  what  kind  of  creatures  live 
in  it,  and  how ;  what  it  is  made  of,  and  what  may  be  made  of  it. 

Secondly.  Where  he  is  going. — That  is  to  say,  what  chances 
or  reports  there  are  of  any  other  world  besides  this;  what 
seems  to  be  the  nature  of  that  other  world ;  and  whether,  for 
information  respecting  it,  he  had  better  consult  the  Bible, 
Koran  or  Council  of  Trent. 

Thirdly.  What  he  had  best  do  under  those  circumstances. — 
That  is  to  say,  what  kind  of  faculties  he  possesses;  what  are 
the  present  state  and  wants  of  mankind ;  what  is  his  place  in 
society;  and  what  are  the  readiest  means  in  his  power  of 
attaining  happiness  and  diffusing  it.  The  man  who  knows 
these  things,  and  who  has  had  his  will  so  subdued  in  the 
learning  them,  that  he  is  ready  to  do  what  he  knows  he 

' ' '  Modern  Painters, '  *  Vol.  V.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co., 
p.  332. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  81 

ought,  I  should  call  educated;  and  the  man  who  knows  them 
not, — uneducated,  though  he  could  talk  all  the  tongues  of 
Babel. 

Our  present  European  system  of  so-called  education  ig- 
nores, or  despises,  not  one,  nor  the  other,  but  all  the  three, 
of  these  great  branches  of  human  knowledge." 

In  the  division  of  the  three  fundamental  knowl- 
edges thus  outlined,  it  is  evident  that  one  great 
purpose,  among  others,  is  to  give  contentment. 

The  most  helpful  and  sacred  work,  therefore,  which  can 
at  present  be  done  for  humanity,  is  to  teach  people  (chiefly 
by  example,  as  all  best  teaching  must  be  done)  not  how  "to 
better  themselves,"  but  how  to  ** satisfy  themselves."  It  is 
the  curse  of  every  evil  nation  and  evil  creature  to  eat,  and 
not  be  satisfied.  The  words  of  blessing  are,  that  they  shall 
eat  and  be  satisfied.  And  as  there  is  only  one  kind  of  water 
which  quenches  all  thirst,  so  there  is  only  one  kind  of  bread 
which  satisfies  all  hunger,  the  bread  of  justice  or  righteous- 
ness; which  hungering  after,  men  shall  always  be  filled,  that 
being  the  bread  of  Heaven;  but  hungering  after  the  bread, 
or  wages,  of  unrighteousness,  shall  not  be  filled,  that  being 
the  bread  of  Sodom. 

And,  in  order  to  teach  men  how  to  be  satisfied,  it  is  nec- 
essary fully  to  understand  the  art  and  joy  of  humble  life, — 
this,  at  present,  of  all  arts  or  sciences  being  the  one  most 
needing  study.  Humble  life — that  is  to  say,  proposing  to 
itself  no  future  exaltation,  but  only  a  sweet  continuance ;  not 
excluding  the  idea  of  foresight,  but  wholly  of  fore-sorrow, 

•"Stones  of  Venice,"  Vol.  III.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co., 
p.  215. 


82  EDUCATION 

and  taking  no  troublous  thought  for  coming  days:  so,  also, 
not  excluding  the  idea  of  providence,  or  provision,  but  wholly 
of  accumulation; — the  life  of  domestic  affection  and  domestic 
peace,  full  of  sensitiveness  to  all  elements  of  costless  and  kind 
pleasure; — therefore,  chiefly  to  the  loveliness  of  the  natural 
world." 

But  education  means  also  sometMng  more  defi- 
nite than  contentment. 

It  means  teaching  children  to  be  clean,  active,  honest  and 
useful.  All  these  characters  can  be  taught,  and  cannot  be 
acquired  by  sickly  and  ill-dispositioned  children  without  be- 
ing taught;  but  they  can  be  untaught  to  any  extent,  by  evil 
habit  and  example  at  home.  Public  schools,  in  which  the  aim 
was  to  form  character  faithfully,  would  return  them  in  due 
time  to  their  parents,  worth  more  than  their  "weight  in 
gold."" 

Education  likewise  means  occupation. 

The  employment  forms  the  habits  of  body  and  mind, 
and  these  are  the  constitution  of  the  man — the  greater  part 
of  his  moral  or  persistent  nature,  whatever  effort,  under  spe- 
cial excitement,  he  may  make  to  change  or  overcome  them. 
Employment  is  the  half,  and  the  primal  half,  of  education — 
it  is  the  warp  of  it;  and  the  fineness  or  the  endurance  of  all 
subsequently  woven  pattern  depends  wholly  on  its  straightness 
and  strength.  And  whatever  difficulty  there  may  be  in  trac- 
ing through  past  history  the  remoter  connections  of  event 

""Modem  Painters,"  Vol.  V.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co., 
p.  411. 

"  "Arrows  of  the  Chace,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  310. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  83 

and  cause,  one  chain  of  sequence  is  always  clear:  the  for- 
mation, namely,  of  the  character  of  nations  by  their  employ- 
ments, and  the  determination  of  their  final  fate  by  their  char- 
acter, .  .  .  For  a  wholesome  human  employment  is  the  first 
and  best  method  of  education,  mental  as  well  as  bodily.  A 
man  taught  to  plough,  row  or  steer  well,  and  a  woman  taught 
to  cook  properly  and  make  dresses  neatly,  are  already  edu- 
cated in  many  essential  moral  habits.  Labor  considered  as  a 
discipline  has  hitherto  been  thought  of  only  for  criminals; 
but  the  real  and  noblest  function  of  labor  is  to  prevent  crime, 
and  not  to  be  iJeformatory  but  Formatory.^'' 

Education  is,  furthermore,  mental  exercise  or 
cultivation. 

May  we  not,  to  begin  with,  accept  this  great  principle — 
that,  as  our  bodies,  to  be  in  health,  must  be  generally  exer- 
cised, so  our  minds,  to  be  in  health,  must  be  generally  culti- 
vated? You  would  not  call  a  man  healthy  who  had  strong 
arms  but  was  paralytic  in  his  feet;  nor  one  who  could  walk 
well,  but  had  no  use  of  his  hands ;  nor  one  who  could  see  well, 
if  he  could  not  hear.  You  would  not  voluntarily  reduce  your 
bodies  to  any  such  partially  developed  state.  Much  more, 
then,  you  would  not,  if  you  could  help  it,  reduce  your  minds 
to  it.  Now,  your  minds  are  endowed  with  a  vast  number  of 
gifts  of  totally  different  uses — limbs  of  mind  as  it  were, 
which,  if  you  don't  exercise,  you  cripple.  One  is  curiosity; 
that  is  a  gift,  a  capacity  of  pleasure  in  knowing;  which  if 
you  destroy,  you  make  yourselves  cold  and  dull.  Another  is 
sympathy;  the  power  of  sharing  in  the  feelings  of  living 
creatures,  which  if  you  destroy,  you  make  yourselves  hard  and 

"Ibid.,  pp.  318,  322. 


84  EDUCATION 

cruel.  Another  of  your  limbs  of  mind  is  admiration;  the 
power  of  enjoying  beauty  or  ingenuity,  which,  if  you  destroy, 
you  make  yourselves  base  and  irreverent.  Another  is  wit;  or 
the  power  of  playing  with  the  lights  on  the  many  sides  of 
truth ;  which  if  you  destroy,  you  make  yourselves  gloomy,  and 
less  useful  and  cheering  to  others  than  you  might  be.  So 
that  in  choosing  your  way  of  work  it  should  be  your  aim,  as 
far  as  possible,  to  bring  out  all  these  faculties,  as  far  as  they 
exist  in  you;  not  one  merely,  nor  another,  but  all  of  them. 
And  the  way  to  bring  them  out,  is  simply  to  concern  your- 
selves attentively  with  the  subjects  of  each  faculty.  To  cul- 
tivate sympathy  you  must  be  among  living  creatures,  and 
thinking  about  them;  and  to  cultivate  admiration,  you  must 
be  among  beautiful  things  and  looking  at  them.^^ 

But  education,  continuing  the  definition,  is  also 
accuracy. 

The  entire  difference  between  education  and  non-education 
(as  regards  the  merely  intellectual  part  of  it),  consists  in  this 
accuracy.  A  well-educated  gentleman  may  not  know  many 
languages, — ^may  not  be  able  to  speUk  any  but  his  own, — may 
have  read  very  few  books.  But  whatever  language  he  knows, 
he  knows  precisely;  whatever  word  he  pronounces  he  pro- 
nounces rightly;  above  aU,  he  is  learned  in  the  peerage  of 
words ;  knows  the  words  of  true  descent  and  ancient  blood  at 
a  glance,  from  words  of  modern  canaille ;  remembers  all  their 
ancestry — their  intermarriages,  distantest  relationships,  and 
the  extent  to  which  they  were  admitted,  and  offices  they  held, 
among  the  national  noblesse  of  words  at  any  time,  and  in  any 
country.     But  an  uneducated  person  may  know  by  memory 

""Two  Paths  on  Art,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dasa  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  85. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKiN  85 

any  number  of  languages,  and  talk  them  all,  and  yet  truly 
know  not  a  word  of  any, — not  a  word  even  of  his  own.  An 
ordinarily  clever  and  sensible  seaman  will  be  able  to  make  his 
way  ashore  at  most  ports;  yet  he  has  only  to  speak  a  sen- 
tence of  any  language  to  be  known  for  an  illiterate  person: 
so  also  the  accent,  or  turn  of  expression  of  a  single  sentence 
will  At  once  mark  a  scholar.  And  this  is  so  strongly  felt,  so 
conclusively  admitted  by  educated  persons,  that  a  false  accent 
or  a  mistaken  syllable  is  enough,  in  the  parliament  of  any 
civilized  nation,  to  assign  to  a  man  ft  certain  degree  of  in- 
ferior standing  for  ever.  And  this  is  right;  but  it  is  a  pity 
that  the  accuracy  insisted  on  is  not  greater,  and  required  to  a 
serious  purpose.^* 

It  is  to  be  said  further  tiiat  education  represents 
the  highest  power. 

Believing  that  all  literature  and  aU  education  are  only 
useful  so  far  as  they  tend  to  confirm  this  calm,  beneficent,  and 
therefore  kingly,  power — first,  over  ourselves,  and,  through 
ourselves,  over  all  around  us,  I  am  now  going  to  ask  you 
to  consider  with  me  farther  what  special  portion  or  kind  of 
this  royal  authority,  arising  out  of  noble  education,  may 
rightly  be  possessed  by  women;  and  how  far  they  also  are 
called  to  a  true  queenly  power.  Not  in  their  households 
merely,  but  over  all  within  their  sphere.  And  in  what  sense, 
if  they  rightly  understood  and  exercised  this  royal  or  gra- 
cious influence,  the  order  and  beauty  induced  by  such  benig- 
nant power  would  justify  us  in  speaking  of  the  territories 
over  which  each  of  them  reigned,  as  "Queens'  Gardens."  ^' 

""Sesame  and  Lilies,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Da^a  Bates  &  Co.,  p.  41. 
»/&td.,  p.  77. 


86  EDUCATION 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  Mr.  Ruskin  believes,  con- 
trary to  the  common  interpretation,  that  education 
should  be  joy ;  it  should  make  for  gladness,  pleasure 
and  happiness. 

And  in  all  these  phases  of  education,  the  main  point,  you 
observe,  is  that  it  sJiould  be  a  beatitude :  and  that  a  man  should 
learn  "xatpetv  op^tos":  and  this  rejoicing  is  above  all  things 
to  be  in  actual  sight ;  you  have  the  truth  exactly  in  the  say- 
ing of  Dante  when  he  is  brought  before  Beatrice,  in  heaven, 
that  his  eyes  * '  satisfied  themselves  for  their  ten  years '  thirst, ' ' 

This,  then,  I  repeat,  is  the  sum  of  education.  All  literature, 
art  and  science  are  vain,  and  worse,  if  they  do  not  enable  you 
to  be  glad;  and  glad  justly. 

And  I  feel  it  distinctly  my  duty,  though  with  solemn  and 
true  deference  to  the  masters  of  education  in  this  university, 
to  say  that  I  believe  our  modern  methods  of  teaching,  and 
especially  the  institution  of  severe  and  frequent  examination, 
to  be  absolutely  opposed  to  this  great  end ;  and  that  the  result 
of  competitive  labour  in  youth  is  infallibly  to  make  men  know 
all  they  learn  wrongly,  and  hate  the  habit  of  learning;  so 
that  instead  of  coming  to  Oxford  to  rejoice  in  their  work,  men 
look  forward  to  the  years  they  are  to  pass  under  her  teach- 
ing as  a  deadly  agony,  from  which  they  are  fain  to  escape, 
and  sometimes  for  their  life,  musi  escape,  into  any  method 
of  sanitary  frivolity.^* 

Education,  furthermore,  means  governing. 

Educate,  or  govern,  they  are  one  and  the  same  word.  Edu- 
cation does  not  mean  teaching  people  to  know  what  they  do 

'•"The  Eagle's  Nest,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co,,  p.  402. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  87 

not  know.  It  means  teaching  them  to  behave  as  they  do  not 
behave.  And  the  true  "compulsory  education"  which  the 
people  now  ask  of  you  is  not  catechism,  but  drill.  It  is  not 
teaching  the  youth  of  England  the  shapes  of  letters  and  the 
tricks  of  numbers ;  and  then  leaving  them  to  turn  their  arith- 
metic to  roguery,  and  their  literature  to  lust.  It  is,  on  the 
contrary,  training  them  into  the  perfect  exercise  and  kingly 
continence  of  their  bodies  and  souls." 

The  education  of  gentlemen  has  been  secured 
largely  through  two  great  authors  and  through 
what  they  represent  and  have  formed.  They  are 
Homer  and  Shakespeare.  To  these  two  some 
would  add  the  Bible. 

All  Greek  gentlemen  were  educated  under  Homer.  All 
Roman  gentlemen,  by  Greek  literature.  All  Italian,  and 
French,  and  English  gentlemen,  by  Roman  literature,  and  by 
its  principles.  Of  the  scope  of  Shakespeare,  I  will  say  only, 
that  the  intellectual  measure  of  every  man  since  bom,  in  the 
domains  of  creative  thought,  may  be  assigned  to  hira,  accord- 
ing to  the  degree  in  which  he  has  been  taught  by  Shakes- 
peare.^' 

The  elements  of  the  education  of  gentlemen  and 
also  the  elements  of  all  education  which  the  state 
provides  should  be : 

First. — The  body  must  be  made  as  beautiful  and  perfect 
in  its  youth  as  it  can  be,  wholly  irrespective  of  ulterior  pur- 

"" Crown  of  Wild  Olive,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  422. 
""Sesame  and  Lilies,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  117. 


88  EDUCATION 

pose.  If  you  mean  afterwards  to  set  the  creature  to  business 
which  will  degrade  its  body  and  shorten  its  life,  first,  I  should 
say,  simply, — you  had  better  let  such  business  alone ; — but  if 
you  must  have  it  done,  somehow,  yet  let  the  living  creature 
whom  you  mean  to  kill,  get  the  full  strength  of  its  body  first, 
and  taste  the  joy  and  bear  the  beauty  of  youth.  After  that, 
poison  it,  if  you  will.  Economically,  the  arrangement  is  a 
wiser  one,  for  it  will  take  longer  in  the  killing  than  if  you 
began  with  it  younger;  and  you  will  get  an  excess  of  work 
out  of  it  which  will  more  than  pay  for  its  training. 

Therefore,  first  teach — as  I  said  in  the  preface  to  Unto  this 
Last — "The  Laws  of  Health,  and  exercises  enjoined  by 
them ; ' '  and  to  this  end  your  schools  must  be  in  fresh  country, 
and  amidst  fresh  air,  and  have  great  extents  of  land  attached 
to  them  in  permanent  estate.  Riding,  running,  all  the  hofi- 
est  personal  exercises  of  offence  and  defence,  and  music, 
should  be  the  primal  heads  of  this  bodily  education. 

Next  to  these  bodily  accomplishments,  the  two  great  mental 
graces  should  be  taught,  Reverence  and  Compassion :  not  that 
these  are  in  a  literal  sense  to  be  ''taught,"  for  they  are  in- 
nate in  every  well-bom  human  creature,  but  they  have  to 
be  developed,  exactly  as  the  strength  of  the  body  must  be, 
by  deliberate  and  constant  exercise.  I  never  understood  why 
Goethe  (in  the  plan  of  education  in  Wilhelm  Meister)  says 
that  reverence  is  not  innate,  but  must  be  taught  from  without ; 
it  seems  to  me  so  fixedly  a  function  of  the  human  spirit,  that 
if  men  can  get  nothing  else  to  reverence  they  will  worship  a 
fool,  or  a  stone,  or  a  vegetable.  But  to  teach  reverence  rightly 
is  to  attach  it  to  the  right  persons  and  things ;  first,  by  setting 
over  your  youth  masters  whom  they  cannot  but  love  and 
respect ;  next,  by  gathering  for  them,  out  of  past  history,  what- 
ever has  been  most  worthy,  in  human  deeds  and  human  pas- 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  89 

sion;  and  loading  them  continually  to  dwell  upon  such  in- 
stances, making  this  the  principal  element  of  emotional  ex- 
citement to  them ;  and,  lastly,  by  letting  them  justly  feel,  as 
far  as  may  be,  the  smallness  of  their  own  powers  and  knowl- 
edge, as  compared  with  the  attainments  of  others. 

Compassion,  on  the  other  hand,  is  to  be  taught  chiefly  by 
making  it  a  point  of  honour,  collaterally  with  courage,  and 
in  the  same  rank  (as  indeed  the  complement  and  evidence 
of  courage),  so  that,  in  the  code  of  unwritten  school  law,  it 
shall  be  held  as  shameful  to  have  done  a  cruel  thing  as  a  cow- 
ardly one.  All  infliction  of  pain  on  weaker  creatures  is  to 
be  stigmatized  as  unmanly  crime;  and  every  possible  oppor- 
tunity taken  to  exercise  the  youths  in  offices  of  some  prac- 
tical help,  and  to  acquaint  them  with  the  realities  of  the  dis- 
tress which,  in  the  joy  fulness  of  entering  into  life,  it  is  so 
difficult  for  those  who  have  not  seen  home  suffering,  to  con- 
ceive. 

Reverence,  then,  and  compassion,  we  are  to  teach  primarily, 
and  with  these,  as  the  bond  and  guardian  of  them,  truth  of 
spirit  and  word,  of  thought  and  sight.  Truth,  earnest  and 
passionate,  sought  for  like  a  treasure  and  kept  like  a  crown. 

This  teaching  of  truth  as  a  habit  will  be  the  chief  work 
the  master  has  to  do;  and  it  will  enter  into  all  parts  of  edu- 
cation. First,  you  must  accustom  the  children  to  close  ac- 
curacy of  statement ;  this  both  as  a  principle  of  honour,  and 
as  an  accomplishment  of  language,  making  them  try  always 
who  shall  speak  truest,  both  as  regards  the  fact  he  has  to 
relate  or  express  (not  concealing  or  exaggerating),  and  as 
regards  the  precision  of  the  words  he  expresses  it  in,  thus  mak- 
ing truth  (which,  indeed,  it  is)  the  test  of  perfect  language, 
and  giving  the  intensity  of  a  moral  purpose  to  the  study  and 
art  of  words:  then  carrying  this  accuracy  into  all  habits  of 


90  EDUCATION 

thought  and  observation  also,  so  as  always  to  think  of  things 
as  they  truly  are  and  to  see  them  as  they  truly  are,  as  far 
as  in  us  rests.  And  it  does  rest  much  in  our  power,  for  all 
false  thoughts  and  seeings  come  mainly  of  our  thinking  of 
what  we  have  no  business  with,  and  looking  for  things  we 
want  to  see,  instead  of  things  that  ought  to  be  seen. 

"Do  not  talk  but  of  what  you  know;  do  not  think  but  of 
what  you  have  materials  to  think  justly  upon;  and  do  not 
look  for  things  only  that  you  like,  when  there  are  others  to 
be  seen" — this  is  the  lesson  to  be  taught  to  our  youth,  and 
inbred  in  them ;  and  that  mainly  by  our  own  example  and  con- 
tinence. Never  teach  a  child  anything  of  which  you  are  not 
yourself  sure ;  and,  above  all,  if  you  feel  anxious  to  force  any- 
thing into  its  mind  in  tender  years,  that  the  virtue  of  youth 
and  early  association  may  fasten  it  there,  be  sure  it  is  no 
lie  which  you  thus  sanctify.  There  is  always  more  to  be 
taught  of  absolute,  incontrovertible  knowledge,  open  to  its 
capacity,  than  any  child  can  learn ;  there  is  no  need  to  teach 
it  anything  doubtful.  Better  that  it  should  be  ignorant  of  a 
thousand  truths,  than  have  consecrated  in  its  heart  a  single 
lie. 

And  for  this,  as  well  as  for  many  other  reasons,  the  princi- 
pal subjects  of  education,  after  history,  ought  to  be  natural 
science  and  mathematics;  but  with  respect  to  these  studies, 
your  schools  will  require  to  be  divided  into  three  groups ;  one 
for  children  who  will  probably  have  to  live  in  cities,  one  for 
those  who  will  live  in  the  country,  and  one  for  those  who  will 
live  at  sea ;  the  schools  for  these  last,  of  course,  being  always 
placed  on  the  coast.  And  for  children  whose  life  is  to  be  in 
cities,  the  subjects  of  study  should  be,  as  far  as  their  dis- 
position will  allow  of  it,  mathematics  and  the  arts;  for  chil- 
dren who  are  to  live  in  the  country,  natural  history  of  birds, 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  91 

insects,  and  plants,  together  with  agriculture  taught  prac- 
tically ;  and  for  children  who  are  to  be  seamen,  physical  geog- 
raphy, astronomy,  and  the  natural  history  of  sea  fish  and  sea 
birds." 

Negatively  it  is  to  be  said  that  education  is  not 
to  be  made  a  means  of  a  livelihood. 

So  far  as  you  come  to  Oxford  in  order  to  get  your  living 
out  of  her,  you  are  ruining  both  Oxford  and  yourselves. 
There  never  has  been,  there  never  can  be,  any  other  law  re- 
specting the  wisdom  that  is  from  above,  than  this  one  pre- 
cept,— "Buy  the  Truth,  and  sell  it  not."  It  is  to  be  costly 
to  you — of  labour  and  patience ;  and  you  are  never  to  sell  it, 
but  to  guard,  and  to  give.^° 

The  result  of  education  is  holiness,  faithfulness 
to  duty  and  kingliness  in  character  and  deed. 

We  once  taught  them  [our  youths]  to  make  Latin  verses, 
and  called  them  educated;  now  we  teach  them  to  leap  and 
to  row,  to  hit  a  ball  with  a  bat,  and  call  them  educated.  Can 
they  plow,  can  they  sow,  can  they  plant  at  the  right  time, 
or  build  with  a  steady  hand?  Is  it  the  effort  of  their  lives 
to  be  chaste,  knightly,  faithful,  holy  in  thought,  lovely  in 
word  and  deed  ?  Indeed  it  is,  with  some,  nay  with  many,  and 
the  strength  of  England  is  in  them,  and  the  hope;  but  we 
have  to  turn  their  courage  from  the  toil  of  war  to  the  toil  of 
mercy;  and  their  intellect  from  dispute  of  words  to  discern- 
ment of  things;  and  their  knighthood  from  the  errantry  of 
adventure  to  the  state  and  fidelity  of  a  kingly  power.    And 

»»"Time  and  Tide,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  pp.  183-186. 
*• ' '  The  Art  of  England, ' '  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  352. 


92  EDUCATION 

then,  indeed,  shall  abide,  for  them,  and  for  us  an  incorruptible 
felicity,  and  an  infallible  religion;  shall  abide  for  us  Faith, 
no  more  to  be  assailed  by  temptation,  no  more  to  be  defended 
by  wrath  and  by  fear; — shall  abide  with  us  Hope,  no  more 
to  be  quenched  by  the  years  that  overwhelm,  or  made  ashamed 
by  the  shadows  that  betray ;  shall  abide  for  us,  and  with  us, 
the  greatest  of  these;  the  abiding  will,  the  abiding  name,  of 
our  Father.    For  the  greatest  of  these,  is  Charity .^^ 

Such  are  some  of  the  elements  and  qualities  of 
education.  But  more  specifically  and  fully  Mr. 
Ruskin  has  a  good  deal  to  say  about  the  body  of 
education  itself.  What  are  the  studies  which  go  to 
make  up  this  great  force  ?  Under  various  forms  in 
several  volumes  Mr.  Ruskin  has  indicated  what  he 
thinks  should  be  the  content  of  education.  The 
elements  of  this  content  differ  in  different  state- 
ments, "but,"  he  says  in  the  last  volume  of  "Mod- 
ern Painters," 

I  have  no  doubt  that  every  child  in  a  civilized  country 
should  be  taught  the  first  principles  of  natural  history,  physi- 
ology and  medicine;  also  to  sing  perfectly,  so  far  as  it  has 
capacity,  and  to  draw  any  definite  form  accurately  to  any 
scale. 

These  things  it  should  be  taught  by  requiring  its  attend- 
ance at  school  not  more  than  three  hours  a  day,  and  less  if 
possible  (the  best  part  of  children's  education  being  in  help- 
ing their  parents  and  families).     The  other  elements  of  its 

'^" Sesame  and  Lilies,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  136. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  93 

instruction  ought  to  have  respect  to  the  trade  by  which  it 
is  to  live. 

Modern  systems  of  improvement  are  too  apt  to  confuse  the 
recreation  of  the  workman  with  his  education.  He  should  be 
educated  for  his  work  before  he  is  allowed  to  undertake  it; 
and  refreshed  and  relieved  while  he  practises  it.*' 

In  **rors/*  in  a  letter  written  in  1871,  he  says: 

Of  Arithmetic,  Geometry  and  Chemistry,  you  can  know  but 
little,  at  the  utmost;  but  that  little,  well  learnt,  serves  you 
well.  And  a  little  Latin,  well  learnt,  will  serve  you  also,  and 
in  a  higher  way  than  any  of  these.*' 

At  the  other  extreme  of  the  educational  process 
he  asks  the  question:  What  should  the  average 
first-class  man  of  Oxford  know?  He  answers  the 
question  by  saying: 

I  should  require,  for  a  first  class,  proficiency  in  two  schools ; 
not,  of  course,  in  all  the  subjects  of  each  chosen  school,  but 
in  a  well  chosen  and  combined  group  of  them.  Thus,  I  should 
call  a  very  good  first-class  man  one  who  had  got  some  such 
range  of  subjects,  and  such  proficiency  in  each,  as  this : 

English,  Greek  and  Mediaevdl-Italian  Literature High. 

English  and  French  History,  and  Archaeology Average. 

Conic  Sections Thorough,  as  far  as  learnt. 

Political  Economy Thorough,  as  far  as  learnt. 

Botany,  or  Chemistry,  or  Physiology High. 

""Modern  Painters,"  Vol.  V.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estea  &  Co., 
p.  413  (note). 

""Pora  Clavigera,"  Vol.  I.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  16. 


94  EDUCATION 

Painting Average. 

Music   Average. 

Bodily  Exercise   High.^* 

For  the  youth  of  England  Mr.  Ruskin  believes 
that  acquaintance  should  be  had  with  at  least  five 
cities  and  with  six  nations.  The  five  cities  are 
Rome,  Athens,  Venice,  Florence,  and  London.  Not 
only  the  English  boy,  but  every  European  boy 
should  know  the  history  of  these  five  towns.  And 
the  six  nations  are  the  Roman,  the  Greek,  the  Sy- 
rian, the  Egyptian,  and,  strange  to  say,  the  Tuscan 
and  the  Arab. 

In  the  process  of  education,  reading,  despite  all 

that  has  been  written  to  the  contrary,  plays  an 

important  part,  and  for  the  content  of  education 

the  books  which  are  most  worth  reading  are  of 

tremendous  consequence.    Mr.  Ruskin  gives  a  list 

of  such  books.    What  he  has  to  say  has  wide  and 

vital  significance: 

I  cannot,  of  course,  suggest  the  choice  of  your  library  to 
you,  every  several  mind  needs  different  books ;  but  there  are 
some  books  which  we  all  need,  and  assuredly,  if  you  read 
Homer,  Plato,  ^sehylus,  Herodotus,  Dante,  Shakespeare,  and 
Spenser,  as  much  as  you  ought,  you  will  not  require  wide  en- 
largement of  shelves  to  right  and  left  of  them  for  purposes 
of  perpetual  study.     Among  modern  books,  avoid  generally 

** ' '  Arrows  of  the  Chace, ' '  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  45. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  95 

magazine  and  review  literature.  Sometimes  it  may  contain 
a  useful  abridgement  or  a  wholesome  piece  of  criticism;  but 
the  chances  are  ten  to  one  it  will  either  waste  your  time  or 
mislead  you.  If  you  want  to  understand  any  subject  what- 
ever, read  the  best  book  upon  it  you  can  hear  of ;  not  a  review 
of  the  book.  If  you  don't  like  the  first  book  you  try,  seek  for 
another ;  but  do  not  hope  ever  to  understand  the  subject  with- 
out pains,  by  a  reviewer's  help.  Avoid  especially  that  class 
of  literature  which  has  a  knowing  tone ;  it  is  the  most  poison- 
ous of  all.  pjvery  good  book,  or  piece  of  book,  is  full  of  ad- 
miration and  awe;  it  may  contain  firm  assertion  or  stern 
satire,  but  it  never  sneers  coldly,  nor  asserts  haughtily,  and  it 
always  leads  you  to  reverence  or  love  something  with  your 
whole  heart.  It  is  not  always  easy  to  distinguish  the  satire 
of  the  venomous  race  of  books  from  the  satire  of  the  noble  and 
pure  ones ;  but  in  general  you  may  notice  that  the  cold-blooded 
Crustacean  and  Batrachian  books  will  sneer  at  sentiment; 
and  the  warm-blooded,  human  books,  at  sin.  Then,  in  gen- 
eral, the  more  you  can  restrain  your  serious  reading  to  reflec- 
tive or  lyric  poetry,  history,  and  natural  history,  avoiding 
fiction  and  the  drama,  the  healthier  your  mind  will  become. 
Of  modern  poetry  keep  to  Scott,  Wordsworth,  Keats,  Crabbe, 
Tennyson,  the  two  Brownings,  Lowell,  Longfellow,  and  Cov- 
entry Patmore,  whose  *  *  Angel  in  the  House  "  is  a  most  finished 
piece  of  writing,  and  the  sweetest  analysis  we  possess  of  quiet 
modem  domestic  feeling;  while  Mrs.  Browning's  "Aurora 
Leigh"  is,  as  far  as  I  know,  the  greatest  poem  which  the  cen- 
tury has  produced  in  any  language.  Cast  Coleridge  at  once 
aside,  as  sickly  and  useless;  and  Shelley  as  shallow  and  ver- 
bose; Byron,  until  your  taste  is  fully  formed,  and  you  are 
able  to  discern  the  magnificence  in  him  from  the  wrong. 
Never  read  bad  or  common  poetry,  nor  write  any  poetry  your- 


96  EDUCATION 

self;  there  is,  perhaps,  rather  too  much  than  too  little  in  the 
world  already. 

Of  reflective  prose,  read  chiefly  Bacon,  Johnson,  and  Helps. 
Carlyle  is  hardly  to  be  named  as  a  writer  for  ' '  beginners, ' '  be- 
cause his  teaching,  though  to  some  of  us  vitally  necessary,  may 
to  others  be  hurtful.  If  you  understand  and  like  him,  read 
him;  if  he  offends  you,  you  are  not  yet  ready  for  him,  and 
perhaps  may  never  be  so;  at  all  events,  give  him  up,  as  you 
would  sea-bathing  if  you  found  it  hurt  you,  till  you  are 
stronger.  Of  fiction,  read  Sir  Charles  Grandison,  Scott's 
novels,  Miss  Edgeworth's,  and,  if  you  are  a  young  lady, 
Madame  de  Genlis',  the  French  Miss  Edgeworth;  making 
these,  I  mean,  your  constant  companions.  Of  course  you  must, 
or  will  read  other  books  for  amusement,  once  or  twice;  but 
you  will  find  that  these  have  an  element  of  perpetuity  in  them, 
existing  in  nothing  else  of  their  kind:  while  their  peculiar 
quietness  and  repose  of  manner  will  also  be  of  the  greatest 
value  in  teaching  you  to  feel  the  same  characters  in  art.  Read 
little  at  a  time,  trying  to  feel  interest  in  little  things,  and 
reading  not  so  much  for  the  sake  of  the  story  as  to  get  ac- 
quainted with  the  pleasant  people  into  whose  company  these 
writers  bring  you.  A  common  book  will  often  give  you  much 
amusement,  but  it  is  only  a  noble  book  which  will  give  you 
dear  friends.  Remember  also  that  it  is  of  less  importance 
to  you  in  your  earlier  years,  that  the  books  you  read  should 
be  clever,  than  that  they  should  be  right.  I  do  not  mean 
oppressively  or  repulsively  instructive ;  but  that  the  thoughts 
they  express  should  be  just,  and  the  feelings  they  excite 
generous.  It  is  not  necessary  for  you  to  read  the  wittiest  or 
the  most  suggestive  books :  it  is  better,  in  general,  to  hear  what 
is  already  known,  and  may  be  simply  said.  Much  of  the  lit- 
erature of  the  present  day,  though  good  to  be  read  by  persons 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  97 

of  ripe  age,  has  a  tendency  to  agitate  rather  than  confinn, 
and  leaves  its  readers  too  frequently  in  a  helpless  or  hopeless 
indignation,  the  worst  possible  state  into  which  the  mind  of 
youth  can  be  thrown.** 

Such  are  some  of  the  thoughts  of  Mr.  Ruskin 
regarding  the  general  end  and  content  of  education. 
He  lays  bare,  and  interprets,  the  defects  and  the 
possible  excellences — the  defects  being  more  sig- 
nificant than  the  excellences — of  the  system  of 
education  known  to  him.  His  interpretations  are 
not  to  be  received  as  philosophic  in  either  thought 
or  expression.  He  writes  with  either  passion  or 
picturesqueness,  or  both,  but  his  motives  are  the 
purest  and  his  aims  the  highest.  The  irregularity 
of  the  content  of  education  which  he  suggests  may 
arise  in  part  from  the  uniqueness  of  his  own  educa- 
tion ;  for  his  education  was  quite  unlike  that  of  the 
English  boy  of  the  upper  middle  class.  It  is  a  sub- 
ject of  debate  among  Eton  and  Harrow  men  which 
school  has  contributed  the  larger  share  to  the 
supremacy  of  the  little  island.  John  Ruskin  was 
not  a  boy  of  Eton  or  of  Harrow  or  even  of  Rugby. 
His  mother  and  brothers  were  his  private  tutors 

""Ethics  of  the  Dust,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  pp.  411- 
413. 


98  EDUCATION 

until  he  went  to  Oxford  in  Ms  fifteenth  year.  He 
is,  therefore,  both  because  of  his  personal  training 
and  also  because  of  the  individualistic  character 
of  his  education,  not  inclined  to  lay  down  full  pro- 
grams of  studies.  The  schedules  he  does  suggest 
seem  to  lay  emphasis  upon  special  studies  without 
consideration  of  the  relation  of  these  studies  to 
each  other.  They  always  emphasize  the  human  in 
the  formal  and  scholastic,  and  the  utilitarian  mo- 
tive rather  than  the  theoretical  aim.  No  master 
has  placed  an  emphasis  stronger  or  more  constant 
on  the  value  of  religion  in  education  than  John 
Ruskin.  The  educational  form  of  this  great  force 
is  largely  instruction  in  the  Bible.  Ruskin  was, 
like  Samuel,  trained  by  his  mother  in  the  knowl- 
edge of  the  Holy  Scriptures.  His  style  in  writing 
he  believes  was  formed  largely  on  the  great  scrip- 
tural models.  In  infancy  he  memorized  many  parts 
of  the  Bible,  particularly  of  the  Old  Testament,  and 
of  its  book  of  Psalms,  and  these  chapters  remained 
a  lasting  resource.  Again  and  again  he  refers  un- 
der diverse  forms  and  at  different  times  to  the 
debt  he  owed  to  his  mother  in  her  compelling  him 
to  learn  so  many  parts  of  the  Bible.  In  the  auto- 
biographic "Praeterita"  he  says: 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  99 

I  have  next  with  deeper  gratitude  to  chronicle  what  I  owed 
to  my  mother  for  the  resolutely  consistent  lessons  which 
so  exercised  me  in  the  Scriptures  as  to  make  every  word  of 
them  familiar  to  my  ear  in  habitual  music, — yet  in  that  famil- 
iarity reverenced,  as  transcending  all  thought,  and  ordain- 
ing all  conduct. 

This  she  effected,  not  by  her  own  sayings  or  personal  author- 
ity ;  but  simply  by  compelling  me  to  read  the  book  thoroughly, 
for  myself.  As  soon  as  I  was  able  to  read  with  fluency,  she 
began  a  course  of  Bible  work  with  me,  which  never  ceased  till 
I  went  to  Oxford.  She  read  alternate  verses  with  me,  watch- 
ing, at  first,  every  intonation  of  my  voice,  and  correcting  the 
false  ones,  till  she  made  me  understand  the  verse,  if  within 
my  reach,  rightly,  and  energetically.  It  might  be  beyond 
me  altogether;  that  she  did  not  care  about;  but  she  made 
sure  that  as  soon  as  I  got  hold  of  it  at  all,  I  should  get  hold 
of  it  by  the  right  end. 

In  this  way  she  began  with  the  first  verse  of  Genesis  and 
went  straight  through,  to  the  last  verse  of  the  Apocalypse; 
hard  names,  numbers,  Levitical  law,  and  all ;  and  began  again 
at  Genesis  the  next  day.  If  a  name  was  hard,  the  better 
the  exercise  in  pronunciation, — if  a  chapter  was  tiresome,  the 
better  lesson  in  patience, — if  loathsome,  the  better  lesson  in 
faith  that  there  was  some  use  in  its  being  so  outspoken.  After 
our  chapters  (from  two  to  three  a  day,  according  to  their 
length,  the  first  thing  after  breakfast,  and  no  interruption 
from  servants  allowed, — none  from  visitors,  who  either  joined 
in  the  reading  or  had  to  stay  upstairs, — and  none  from  any 
visitings  or  excursions,  except  real  travelling,)  I  had  to  learn 
a  few  verses  by  heart,  or  repeat,  to  make  sure  I  had  not  lost, 
something  of  what  was  already  known ;  and,  with  the  chapters 


100  EDUCATION 

thus  gradually  possessed  from  the  first  word  to  the  last,  I  had 
to  learn  the  whole  body  of  the  fine  old  Scottish  paraphrases, 
which  are  good,  melodious,  and  forceful  verse ;  and  to  which, 
together  with  the  Bible  itself,  I  owe  the  first  cultivation  of 
my  ear  in  sound. 

It  is  strange  that  all  of  the  pieces  of  the  Bible  which  my 
mother  thus  taught  me,  that  which  cost  me  most  to  learn, 
and  which  was,  to  my  child's  mind,  chiefly  repulsive — ^the 
119th  Psalm — has  now  become  of  all  the  most  precious  to  me, 
in  its  overflowing  and  glorious  passion  of  love  for  the  Law 
of  God,  in  opposition  to  the  abuse  of  it  by  modern  preachers 
of  what  they  imagine  to  be  His  gospel. 

But  it  is  only  by  deliberate  effort  that  I  recall  the  long 
morning  hours  of  toil,  as  regular  as  sunrise, — toil  on  both 
sides  equal — ^by  which,  year  after  year,  my  mother  forced 
me  to  learn  these  paraphrases,  and  chapters,  (the  eighth  of 
1st  Kings  being  one — try  it,  good  reader,  in  a  leisure  hour!) 
allowing  not  so  much  as  a  syllable  to  be  missed  or  misplaced ; 
while  every  sentence  was  required  to  be  said  over  and  over 
again  till  she  was  satisfied  with  the  accent  of  it.  I  recollect 
a  struggle  between  us  of  about  three  weeks,  concerning  the 
accent  of  the  "of"  in  the  lines 

"Shall  any   following   spring  revive 
The  ashes  of  the  urn?" — 

I  insisting,  partly  in  childish  obstinacy,  and  partly  in  true 
instinct  for  rhythm  (being  wholly  careless  on  the  subject  both 
of  urns  and  their  contents),  on  reciting  it  with  an  accented 
of.  It  was  not,  I  say,  till  after  three  weeks'  labor,  that  my 
mother  got  the  accent  lightened  on  the  "of"  and  laid  on  the 
ashes,  to  her  mind.  But  had  it  taken  three  years,  she  would 
have  done  it,  having  once  undertaken  to  do  it.    And,  assur- 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  101 

edly,  had  she  not  done  it, — well,  there's  no  knowing  what 
would  have  happened ;  but  I  am  very  thankful  she  did. 

I  have  just  opened  my  oldest  (in  use)  Bible, — a  small, 
closely,  and  very  neatly  printed  volume  it  is,  printed  in  Edin- 
burgh by  Sir  D.  Hunter  Blair  and  J,  Bruce,  Printers  to  the 
King's  Most  Excellent  Majesty,  in  1816.  Yellow,  now,  with 
age,  and  flexible,  but  not  unclean,  with  much  use,  except  that 
the  lower  corners  of  the  pages  at  8th  of  1st  Kings,  and  32d 
Deuteronomy,  are  worn  somewhat  thin  and  dark,  the  learning 
of  these  two  chapters  having  cost  me  much  pains.  My  moth- 
er's list  of  the  chapters  with  which,  thus  learned,  she  estab- 
lished my  soul  in  life,  has  just  fallen  out  of  it.  I  will  take 
what  indulgence  the  incurious  reader  can  give  me,  for  print- 
ing the  list  thus  accidentally  occurrent: 

Exodus,  chapters  15th  and  20th. 

2  Samuel,  chapter  1st,  from  17th  verse  to  the  end. 

1  Kings,  chapter  8th. 

Psalms,  chapters  23d,  32d,  90th,  91st,  103d,  112th,  119th, 

139th. 
Proverbs,  chapters  2d,  3d,  8th,  12th. 
Isaiah,  chapter  58th. 
Matthew,  chapters  5th,  6th,  7th. 
Acts,  chapter  26th. 
1  Corinthians,  chapters  13th,  15th. 
James,  chapter  4th. 
Revelation,  chapters  5th,  6th. 

And  truly,  though  I  have  picked  up  the  elements  of  a  little 
further  knowledge — in  mathematics,  meteorology,  and  the  like, 
in  after  life, — and  owe  not  a  little  to  the  teaching  of  many 
people,  this  maternal  installation  of  my  mind  in  that  prop- 


102  EDUCATION 

erty  of  chapters,  I  count  very  confidently  the  most  precious, 
and,  on  the  whole,  the  one  essential  part  of  all  my  education. 

And  it  is  perhaps  already  time  to  mark  what  advantage  and 
mischief,  by  the  chances  of  life  up  to  seven  years  old,  had 
been  irrevocably  determined  for  me.^' 

In  addition  to  the  cultural  element  of  a  religious 
education,  mention  should  be  made  of  the  moral 
quality.  This  moral  quality  has  in  it  a  tremendous 
significance  as  standing  for  efficiency  of  the  highest 
order.  Its  value  specially  emerges  in  the  Greek 
authors,  but  it  characterizes  the  great  literature  of 
every  nation.    Mr.  Ruskin  says : 

One  farther  great,  and  greatest,  sign  of  the  Divinity  in 
this  enchanted  work  of  the  classic  masters,  I  did  not  then 
assert, — for,  indeed,  I  had  not  then  myself  discerned  it, — 
namely,  that  this  power  of  noble  composition  is  never  given 
but  with  accompanying  instinct  of  moral  law;  and  that  so 
severe,  that  the  apparently  too  complete  and  ideal  justice 
which  it  proclaims  has  received  universally  the  name  of 
** poetical"  justice — the  justice  conceived  only  by  the  men 
of  consummate  imaginative  power.  So  that  to  say  of  any 
man  that  he  has  power  of  design,  is  at  once  to  say  of  him 
that  he  is  using  it  on  God's  side;  for  it  can  only  have  been 
taught  him  by  that  Master,  and  cannot  be  taught  by  the 
use  of  it  against  Him.  And  therefore  every  great  composition 
in  the  world,  every  great  piece  of  painting  or  literature — 
without  any  exception,  from  the  birth  of  Man  to  this  hour — 
is  an  assertion  of  moral  law,  as  strict,  when  we  examine  it, 


3e<( 


Praetwita,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  35. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  103 

as  the  Eumenides  or  the  Divina  Commedia;  while  the  total 
collapse  of  all  power  of  artistic  design  in  Italy  at  this  day 
has  been  signalized  and  sealed  by  the  production  of  an  epic 
poem  in  praise  of  the  Devil,  and  in  declaration  that  God  is  a 
malignant  "Larva."" 

Mr.  Ruskin  does  not  decline  to  touch  upon  one 
of  the  most  fundamental  and  insidious  ills  which 
disintegrate  education  and  every  other  human 
force.  Against  it  he  thunders  with  tremendous 
passion.    From  Venice  in  the  year  1877,  he  writes  ; 

Hence,  if  from  any  place  in  earth,  I  ought  to  be  able  to 
send  you  some  words  of  warning  to  English  youth,  for  the 
ruin  of  this  mighty  city  was  all  in  one  word — fornication. 
Fools  who  think  they  can  write  history  will  tell  you  it  was 
"the  discovery  of  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,"  and  the  like! 
Alas  it  was  indeed  the  covering  of  every  hope  she  had,  in  God 
and  his  Law. 

For  indeed,  my  dear  friend,  I  doubt  if  you  can  fight  this 
evil  by  mere  heroism  and  common-sense.  Not  many  men  are 
heroes ;  not  many  are  rich  in  common-sense.  They  will  train 
for  a  boat-race;  will  they  for  the  race  of  hfe?  For  the  ap- 
plause of  the  pretty  girls  in  blue  on  the  banks;  yes.  But 
to  win  the  soul  and  body  of  a  noble  woman  for  their  own 
forever,  will  they?  Not  as  things  are  going,  I  think,  though 
how  or  where  they  are  to  go  or  end  is  to  me  at  present 
inconceivable.^* 

""Fors  Clavigera,"  Vol.  IV.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co., 
p.  176. 

""Arrows  of  the  Chace,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  330. 


104  EDUCATION 

Further  he  says : 

All  that  you  have  advised  and  exposed  is  wisely  said  and 
bravely  told ;  but  no  advice,  no  exposure,  will  be  of  use,  until 
the  right  relation  exists  again  between  the  father  and  the 
mother  and  their  son.  To  deserve  his  confidence,  to  keep  it 
as  the  chief  treasure  committed  in  trust  to  them  by  God :  to 
be  the  father  his  strength,  the  mother  his  sanctification,  and 
both  his  chosen  refuge,  through  all  weakness,  evil,  danger, 
and  amazement  of  his  young  life.  My  friend,  while  you  still 
teach  in  Oxford  the  "philosophy,"  forsooth,  of  that  poor 
cretinous  wretch,  Stuart  Mill,  and  are  endeavouring  to  open 
other  "careers"  to  English  women  than  that  of  the  Wife  and 
the  Mother,  you  won't  make  your  men  chaste  by  recommend- 
ing them  to  leave  off  tea.^'' 

I  could  say  ever  so  much  more,  of  course,  if  there  were 
only  time,  or  if  it  would  be  of  any  use — about  the  misappli- 
ance  of  the  imagination.  But  really,  the  essential  thing  is  the 
founding  of  real  schools  of  instruction  for  both  boys  and  girls 
— first,  in  domestic  medicine  and  all  that  it  means;  and  sec- 
ondly, in  the  plain  moral  law  of  all  humanity:  "Thou  shalt 
not  commit  adultery,"  with  all  that  it  means.^° 

Although  the  moral  and  religious  elements  are  of 
supreme  consequence,  yet  there  are  other  special 
elements  and  forces  which  are  preeminent.  Fifty 
years  ago  Mr.  Euskin  distinguished  the  sense  and 
half -sense  of  so-called  practical  education.  In  this 
interpretation  he  also  has  much  to  say  respecting 

"Hid.,  p.  331. 
**Ibid.,  p.  333. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  105 

manual  training  and  trade  schools.   What  he  wrote 
fifty  yeai*s  ago  is  apt  for  the  present  time. 

In  order  that  men  may  be  able  to  support  themselves  when 
they  are  grown,  their  strength  must  be  properly  developed 
while  they  are  young ;  and  the  state  should  always  see  to  this 
— not  allowing  their  health  to  be  broken  by  too  early  labour, 
nor  their  powers  to  be  wasted  for  want  of  knowledge.  Some 
questions  connected  with  this  matter  are  noticed  farther  on 
under  the  head  of  "trial  schools:"  one  point  I  must  notice 
here,  that  I  believe  all  youths  of  whatever  rank,  ought  to 
learn  some  manual  trade  thoroughly ;  for  it  is  quite  wonderful 
how  much  a  man 's  views  of  life  are  cleared  by  the  attainment 
of  the  capacity  of  doing  any  one  thing  well  with  his  hands 
and  arms.  For  a  long  time,  what  right  life  there  was  in  the 
upper  classes  of  Europe  depended  in  no  small  degree  on  the 
necessity  which  each  man  was  under  of  being  able  to  fence; 
at  this  day,  the  most  useful  things  which  boys  learn  at  pub- 
lic schools,  are,  I  believe,  riding,  rowing,  and  cricketing.  But 
it  would  be  far  better  that  members  of  Parliament  should  be 
able  to  plough  straight,  and  make  a  horseshoe,  than  only  to 
feather  oars  neatly  or  point  their  toes  prettily  in  stirrups. 
Then,  in  literary  and  scientific  teaching,  the  great  point  of 
economy  is  to  give  the  discipline  of  it  through  knowledge 
which  will  immediately  bear  on  practical  life.  Our  literary 
work  has  long  been  economically  useless  to  us  because  too 
much  concerned  with  dead  languages ;  and  our  scientific  work 
will  yet,  for  some  time,  be  a  good  deal  lost,  because  scientific 
men  are  too  fond  or  too  vain  of  their  systems,  and  waste 
the  student's  time  in  endeavouring  to  give  him  large  views, 
and  make  him  perceive  interesting  connections  of  facts ;  when 
there  is  not  one  student,  no,  nor  one  man,  in  a  thousand,  who 


106  EDUCATION 

can  feel  the  beauty  of  a  system,  or  even  take  it  clearly  into 
his  head;  but  nearly  all  men  can  understand,  and  most  will 
be  interested  in,  the  facts  which  bear  on  daily  life.  Botanists 
have  discovered  some  wonderful  connection  between  nettles 
and  figs,  which  a  cow-boy  who  will  never  see  a  ripe  fig  in  his 
life  need  not  be  at  all  troubled  about ;  but  it  will  be  interest- 
ing to  him  to  know  what  effect  nettles  have  on  hay,  and  what 
taste  they  will  give  to  porridge;  and  it  will  give  him  nearly 
a  new  life  if  he  can  be  got  but  once,  in  a  spring-time,  to  look 
well  at  the  beautiful  circlet  of  the  white  nettle  blossom,  and 
work  out  with  his  school-master  the  curves  of  its  petals,  and 
the  way  it  is  set  on  its  central  mast.  So,  the  principle  of 
chemical  equivalents,  beautiful  as  it  is,  matters  far  less  to 
a  peasant  boy,  and  even  to  most  sons  of  gentlemen,  than  their 
knowing  how  to  find  whether  the  water  is  wholesome  in  the 
back-kitchen  cistern,  or  whether  the  seven-acre  field  wants 
sand  or  chalk. 

Having,  then,  directed  the  studies  of  our  youth  so  as  to 
make  them  practically  serviceable  men  at  the  time  of  their 
entrance  into  life,  that  entrance  should  always  be  ready  for 
them  in  cases  where  their  private  circumstances  present  no 
opening.  There  ought  to  be  government  establishments  for 
every  trade,  in  which  all  youths  who  desired  it  should  be 
received  as  apprentices  on  their  leaving  school;  and  men 
thrown  out  of  work  received  at  all  times.  At  these  govern- 
ment manufactories  the  discipline  should  be  strict,  and  the 
wages  steady,  not  varying  at  all  in  proportion  to  the  demand 
for  the  article,  but  only  in  proportion  to  the  price  of  food; 
the  commodities  produced  being  laid  up  in  store  to  meet 
sudden  demands,  and  sudden  fluctuations  in  prices  prevenced: 
— that  gradual  and  necessary  fluctuation  only  being  allowed 
which  is  properly  consequent  on  larger  or  more  limited  supply 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  107 

of  raw  material  and  other  natural  causes.  When  there  was 
a  visible  tendency  to  produce  a  glut  of  any  commodity,  that 
tendency  should  be  checked  by  directing  the  youth  at  the 
government  schools  into  other  trades ;  and  the  yearly  surplus 
of  commodities  should  be  the  principal  means  of  government 
provision  for  the  poor.'^ 

The  principles  thus  laid  down  are  indeed  timely 
for  the  present  conditions  in  America  and  in  the 
whole  world. 

Upon  another  side  also  of  current  problems  our 
author  has  light  to  shed,  to  wit,  vocational  guid- 
ance: 

It  is  difficult  to  analyse  the  characters  of  mind  which  cause 
youths  to  mistake  their  vocation,  and  to  endeavour  to  be- 
come artists,  when  they  have  no  true  artist's  gift.  But  the 
fact  is,  that  multitudes  of  young  men  do  this,  and  that  by 
far  the  greater  number  of  living  artists  are  men  who  have 
mistaken  their  vocation.  The  peculiar  circumstances  of  mod- 
ern life,  which  exhibit  art  in  almost  every  form  to  the  sight 
of  the  youths  in  our  great  cities,  have  a  natural  tendency 
to  fill  their  imaginations  with  borrowed  ideas,  and  their  minds 
with  imperfect  science ;  the  mere  dislike  of  mechanical  employ- 
ments, either  felt  to  be  irksome,  or  believed  to  be  degrading, 
urges  numbers  of  young  men  to  become  painters,  in  the  same 
temper  in  which  they  would  enlist  or  go  to  sea;  others,  the 
sons  of  engravers  or  artists,  taught  the  business  of  the  art  by 
their  parents,  and  having  no  gift  for  it  themselves,  follow  it 
as  a  means  of  livelihood,  in  an  ignoble  patience ;  or,  if  ambi- 

""A  Joy  Forever,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  224. 


108  EDUCATION 

tious,  seek  to  attract  regard,  or  distance  rivalry,  by  fantastic, 
meretricious,  or  unprecedented  applications  of  their  mechani- 
cal skill;  while  finally,  many  men  earnest  in  feeling,  and  con- 
scientious in  principle,  mistake  their  desire  to  be  useful  for 
a  love  of  art,  and  their  quickness  of  emotion  for  its  capacity, 
and  pass  their  lives  in  painting  moral  and  instructive  pictures^ 
which  might  almost  justify  us  in  thinking  nobody  could  be  a 
painter  but  a  rogue.  On  the  other  hand,  I  believe  that  much 
of  the  best  artistical  intellect  is  daily  lost  in  other  avocations. 
Generally,  the  temper  which  would  make  an  admirable  artist 
is  humble  and  observant,  capable  of  taking  much  interest 
in  little  things,  and  of  entertaining  itself  pleasantly  in  the 
dullest  circumstances.  Suppose,  added  to  these  characters, 
a  steady  conscientiousness  which  seeks  to  do  its  duty  wherever 
it  may  be  placed,  and  the  power,  denied  to  few  artistical 
minds,  of  ingenious  invention  in  almost  any  practical  depart- 
ment of  human  skill,  and  it  can  hardly  be  doubted  that  the 
very  humility  and  conscientiousness  which  would  have  per- 
fected the  painter,  have  in  many  instances  prevented  his  be- 
coming one;  and  that  in  the  quiet  life  of  our  steady  crafts- 
men— sagacious  manufacturers,  and  uncomplaining  clerks — 
there  may  frequently  be  concealed  more  genius  than  ever  is 
raised  to  the  direction  of  our  public  works,  or  to  be  the  mark 
of  our  public  praises.^^ 

Yet  in  all  such  vocational  guidance,  in  training 
for  trades,  and  in  all  types  of  manual  education, 
it  is  to  be  remembered  that  these  arts  are  expression 
of  the  mind.    Manual  training  is  really  cerebral 

*'Ibid.,  p.  229. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  109 

training.   With  the  cerebral  training  is  to  be  united 
also  ethical  training. 

.  .  .  The  manual  arts  are  as  accurate  exponents  of  ethical 
state,  as  other  modes  of  expression ;  first,  with  absolute  preci- 
sion, of  that  of  the  workman,  and  then  with  precision,  dis- 
guised by  many  distorting  influences,  of  that  of  the  nation 
to  which  he  belongs." 

For  all  these  manual  endeavors  it  is  not  to  be 
forgotten  that  the  higher  academic  ideals  have 
value.    Mr.  Ruskin  says : 

To  which  good  end,  it  will  indeed  contribute  that  we  add 
some  practice  of  the  lower  arts  to  our  scheme  of  University 
education ;  but  the  thing  which  is  vitally  necessary  is,  that  we 
should  extend  the  spirit  of  University  education  to  the  prac- 
tice of  the  lower  arts.^* 

Indeed  art  and  scholarship  are  never  to  be  sep- 
arated. 

What  art  may  do  for  scholarship,  I  have  no  right  to  con- 
jecture; but  what  scholarship  may  do  for  art,  I  may  in  all 
modesty  tell  you.  Hitherto,  great  artists,  though  always  gen- 
tlemen, have  yet  been  too  exclusively  craftsmen.  Art  has  been 
less  thoughtful  than  we  suppose;  it  has  taught  much,  but 
much,  also,  falsely.  Many  of  the  greatest  pictures  are  enig- 
mas; others,  beautiful  toys;  others,  harmful  and  corrupting 
toys.    In  the  loveliest  there  is  something  weak;  in  the  great- 

"" Lectures  on  Art,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  242. 
••/bid.,  p.  199. 


110  EDUCATION 

est  there  is  something  guilty.  And  this,  gentlemen,  if  you 
will,  is  the  new  thing  that  may  come  to  pass, — that  the  schol- 
ars of  England  may  resolve  to  teach  also  with  the  silent  power 
of  the  arts ;  and  that  some  among  you  may  so  learn  and  use 
them,  that  pictures  may  be  painted  which  shall  not  be  enigmas 
any  more,  but  open  teachings  of  what  can  no  otherwise  be  so 
well  shown ;  which  shall  not  be  fevered  or  broken  visions  any 
more,  but  shall  be  filled  with  the  indwelling  light  of  self- 
possessed  imagination;  which  shall  not  be  stained  or  enfee- 
bled any  more  by  evil  passion,  but  glorious  with  the  strength 
and  chastity  of  noble  human  love;  and  which  shall  no  more 
degrade  or  disguise  the  work  of  God  in  heaven,  but  testify  of 
Him  as  here  dwelling  with  men,  and  walking  with  them,  not 
angry,  in  the  garden  of  the  earth.^^ 

In  Mr.  Ruskin's  conception  of  education  the 
training  of  the  workingman  plays  a  significant 
part.  The  lastingness  of  his  relation  to  the  popular 
movement  to  this  end  is  embodied  at  the  present 
time  in  what  is  known  as  Ruskin  College  at  Oxford, 
an  independent  foundation,  and  one  which  seeks  to 
carry  out  his  purposes  by  his  methods. 

At  this  point  emerges  the  opinion  of  the  author 
of  Queens'  Gardens  on  the  education  of  women. 
His  conception  of  what  the  education  of  women 
should  be  arises  from  his  conception  of  woman's 
nature  itself.  Of  this  nature  in  contrast  with  the 
nature  of  man,  he  says : 

»76id.,  p.  320. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  111 

The  man's  power  is  active,  progressive,  defensive.  He  is 
eminently  the  doer,  the  creator,  the  discoverer,  the  defender. 
His  intellect  is  for  speculation  and  invention ;  his  energy  for 
adventure,  for  war,  and  for  conquest,  wherever  war  is  just, 
wherever  conquest  necessary.  But  the  woman's  power  is  for 
rule,  not  for  battle, — and  her  intellect  is  not  for  invention 
or  creation,  but  for  sweet  ordering,  arrangement  and  decision. 
She  sees  the  qualities  of  things,  their  claims  and  their  places. 
Her  great  function  is  Praise;  she  enters  into  no  contest,  but 
infallibly  judges  the  crown  of  contest.  By  her  office,  and 
place,  she  is  protected  from  all  danger  and  temptation.  The 
man,  in  his  rough  work  in  open  world,  must  encounter  all 
peril  and  trial : — to  him,  therefore,  the  failure,  the  offence,  the 
inevitable  error :  often  he  must  be  wounded,  or  subdued,  often 
misled,  and  always  hardened.  But  he  guards  the  woman  from 
all  this;  within  his  house,  as  ruled  by  her,  unless  she  herself 
has  sought  it,  need  enter  no  danger,  no  temptation,  no  cause 
of  error  or  offence.  This  is  the  true  nature  of  home — it  is  the 
place  of  Peace ;  the  shelter,  not  only  from  all  injury,  but  from 
all  terror,  doubt,  and  division.  In  so  far  as  it  is  not  this, 
it  is  not  home :  so  far  as  the  anxieties  of  the  outer  life  pene- 
trate into  it,  and  the  inconsistently-minded,  unknown,  un- 
loved, or  hostile  society  of  the  outer  world  is  allowed  by  either 
husband  or  wife  to  cross  the  threshold,  it  ceases  to  be  home; 
it  is  then  only  a  part  of  that  outer  world  which  you  have 
roofed  over,  and  lighted  fire  in.  But  so  far  as  it  is  a  sacred 
place,  a  vestal  temple,  a  temple  of  the  hearth  watched  over 
by  Household  Gods,  before  whose  faces  none,  may  come  but 
those  whom  they  can  receive  with  love, — so  far  as  it  is  this, 
and  roof  and  fire  are  types  only  of  a  nobler  shade  and  light, — • 
shade  as  of  the  rock  in  a  weary  land,  and  light  as  of  the  Pharos 


112  EDUCATION 

in  the  stormy  sea; — so  far  it  vindicates  the  name,  and  fulfils 
the  praise,  of  home. 

And  wherever  a  true  wife  comes,  this  home  is  always  round 
her.  The  stars  only  may  be  over  her  head;  the  glow-worm 
in  the  night-cold  grass  may  be  the  only  fire  at  her  foot:  but 
home  is  yet  wherever  she  is ;  and  for  a  noble  woman  it  stretches 
far  round  her,  better  than  ceiled  with  cedar,  or  painted  with 
vermilion,  shedding  its  quiet  light  far,  for  those  who  else 
were  homeless. 

This,  then,  I  believe  to  be, — will  you  not  admit  it  to  be, — 
the  woman 's  true  place  and  power  ?  But  do  not  you  see  that 
to  fulfil  this,  she  must — as  far  as  one  can  use  such  terms  of 
a  human  creature — be  incapable  of  error?  So  far  as  she 
rules,  all  must  be  right,  or  nothing  is.  She  must  be  endur- 
ingly,  incorruptibly  good;  instinctively,  infallibly  wise — 
wise,  not  for  self -development,  but  for  self-renunciation :  wise, 
not  that  she  may  set  herself  above  her  husband,  but  that  she 
may  never  fail  from  his  side :  wise,  not  with  the  narrowness 
of  insolent  and  loveless  pride,  but  with  the  passionate  gentle- 
ness of  an  infinitely  variable,  because  infinitely  applicable, 
modesty  of  service — the  true  changefulness  of  woman.  In 
that  great  sense — "La  donna  e  mobile,"  not  "Qual  pium'  al 
vento ; "  no,  nor  yet ' '  Variable  as  the  shade,  by  the  light  quiv- 
ering aspen  made;"  but  variable  as  the  light,  manifold  in 
fair  and  serene  division,  that  it  may  take  the  color  of  all 
that  it  falls  upon,  and  exalt  it.^® 

Upon  this  interpretation  of  woman's  nature  he 
bases  his  conception  of  woman's  education  and  of 
this  he  says  at  length : 

*•  * '  Sesame  and  Lilies, ' '  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  86. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  113 

The  first  of  our  duties  to  her — no  thoughtful  persons  now 
doubt  this, — is  to  secure  for  her  such  physical  training  and 
exercises  as  may  confirm  her  health,  and  perfect  her  beauty, 
the  highest  refinement  of  that  beauty  being  unattainable  with- 
out splendor  of  activity  and  of  delicate  strength.  To  perfect 
her  beauty,  I  say,  and  increase  its  power;  it  cannot  be  too 
powerful,  nor  shed  its  sacred  light  too  far:  only  remember 
that  all  physical  freedom  is  vain  to  produce  beauty  without 
a  corresponding  freedom  of  heart.  .  .  . 

"Vital  feelings  of  delight,"  observe.  There  are  deadly 
feelings  of  delight ;  but  the  natural  ones  are  vital,  necessary 
to  very  life. 

And  they  must  be  feelings  of  delight,  if  they  are  to  be 
vital.  Do  not  think  you  can  make  a  girl  lovely,  if  you  do  not 
make  her  happy.  There  is  not  one  restraint  you  put  on  a 
good  girl's  nature — there  is  not  one  check  you  give  to  her 
instincts  of  affection  or  of  effort — which  will  not  be  indelibly 
written  on  her  features,  with  a  hardness  which  is  all  the  more 
painful  because  it  takes  away  the  brightness  from  the  eyes  of 
innocence,  and  the  charm  from  the  brow  of  virtue. 

This  for  the  means :  now  note  the  end.  Take  from  the  same 
poet,  in  two  lines,  a  perfect  description  of  womanly  beauty — 

"A  countenance  in  which  did  meet 
Sweet  records,  promises  as  sweet." 

The  perfect  loveliness  of  a  woman's  countenance  can  only 
consist  in  that  majestic  peace,  which  is  founded  in  the  mem- 
ory of  happy  and  useful  years, — full  of  sweet  records;  and 
from  the  joining  of  this  with  that  yet  more  majestic  childish- 
ness, which  is  still  full  of  change  and  promise; — opening 
always — modest  at  once,  and  bright,  with  hope  of  better  things 


114  EDUCATION 

to  be  won,  and  to  be  bestowed.  There  is  no  old  age  where 
there  is  still  that  promise — it  is  eternal  youth. 

Thus,  then,  you  have  first  to  mould  her  physical  frame,  and 
then,  as  the  strength  she  gains  will  permit  you,  to  fill  and 
temper  her  mind  with  all  knowledge  and  thoughts  which  tend 
to  confirm  its  natural  instincts  of  justice,  and  refine  its  natural 
tact  of  love. 

All  such  knowledge  should  be  given  her  as  may  enable  her 
to  understand,  and  even  to  aid,  the  work  of  men:  and  yet 
it  should  be  given,  not  as  knowledge, — ^not  as  if  it  were,  or 
could  be,  for  her  an  object  to  know;  but  only  to  feel,  and  to 
judge.  It  is  of  no  moment,  as  a  matter  of  pride  or  perfect- 
ness  in  herself,  whether  she  knows  many  languages  or  one; 
but  it  is  of  the  utmost,  that  she  should  be  able  to  show  kind- 
ness to  a  stranger,  and  to  understand  the  sweetness  of  a 
stranger's  tongue.  It  is  of  no  moment  to  her  own  worth 
or  dignity  that  she  should  be  acquainted  with  this  science 
or  that;  but  it  is  of  the  highest  that  she  should  be  trained 
in  habits  of  accurate  thought ;  that  she  should  understand  the 
meaning,  the  inevitableness,  and  the  loveliness  of  natural  laws, 
and  follow  at  least  some  one  path  of  scientific  attainment, 
as  far  as  to  the  threshold  of  that  bitter  Valley  of  Humiliation, 
into  which  only  the  wisest  and  bravest  of  men  can  descend, 
owning  themselves  forever  children,  gathering  pebbles  on  a 
boundless  shore.  It  is  of  little  consequence  how  many  posi- 
tions of  cities  she  knows,  or  how  many  dates  of  events,  or  how 
many  names  of  celebrated  persons — it  is  not  the  object  of 
education  to  turn  a  woman  into  a  dictionary ;  but  it  is  deeply 
necessary  that  she  should  be  taught  to  enter  with  her  whole 
personality  into  the  history  she  reads ;  to  picture  the  passages 
of  it  vitally  in  her  own  bright  imagination;  to  apprehend, 
with  her  fine  instincts,  the  pathetic  circumstances  and  dra- 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  115 

matic  relations,  which  the  historian  too  often  only  eclipses  by 
his  reasoning,  and  disconnects  by  his  arrangement:  it  is  for 
her  to  trace  the  hidden  equities  of  divine  reward,  and  catch 
sight,  through  the  darkness,  of  the  fateful  threads  of  woven 
fire  that  connect  error  with  its  retribution.  But,  chiefly  of 
all,  she  is  to  be  taught  to  extend  the  limits  of  her  sympathy 
with  respect  to  that  history  which  is  being  for  her  deter- 
mined, as  the  moments  pass  in  which  she  draws  her  peaceful 
breath :  and  to  the  contemporary  calamity  which,  were  it  but 
rightly  mourned  by  her,  would  recur  no  more  hereafter.  She 
is  to  exercise  herself  in  imagining  what  would  be  the  effects 
upon  her  mind  and  conduct,  if  she  were  daily  brought  into 
the  presence  of  the  suffering  which  is  not  the  less  real  because 
shut  from  her  sight.  She  is  to  be  taught  somewhat  to  under- 
stand the  nothingness  of  the  proportion  which  that  little 
world  in  which  she  lives  and  loves,  bears  to  the  world  in  which 
God  lives  and  loves; — and  solemnly  she  is  to  be  taught  to 
strive  that  her  thoughts  of  piety  may  not  be  feeble  in  propor- 
tion to  the  number  they  embrace,  nor  her  prayer  more  languid 
than  it  is  for  the  momentary  relief  from  pain  of  her  husband 
or  her  child,  when  it  is  uttered  for  the  multitudes  of  those  who 
have  none  to  love  them, — and  is,  "for  all  who  are  desolate 
and  oppressed. ' '  '^ 

In  the  diversity  of  interpretation  of  things 
educational,  Mr.  Ruskin  does  write  of  the  value  of 
certain  special  studies.  Among  them  he  is  inclined 
to  give  a  high  place  to  logic.  In  his  great  early- 
work  he  refers  in  more  than  one  place  to  this  sub- 
ject. 

"JfttU,  p.  88. 


116  EDUCATION     - 

Next  to  imagination,  the  power  of  perceiving  logical  rela- 
tion is  one  of  the  rarest  among  men ;  certainly,  of  those  with 
whom  I  have  conversed,  I  have  found  always  ten  who  had  deep 
feeling,  quick  wit,  or  extended  knowledge,  for  one  who  could 
set  down  a  syllogism  without  a  flaw;  and  for  ten  who  could 
set  down  a  syllogism,  only  one  who  could  entirely  understand 
that  a  square  has  four  sides.^^ 

But,  as  I  have  already  intimated,  Mr.  Ruskin 
has  a  lower  opinion  of  the  value  of  the  sciences 
in  education  than  he  has  of  logic  and  of  literature. 
No  love  is  lost  between  him  and  the  scientist.  In 
the  year  1884,  he  writes : 

The  scientists  slink  out  of  my  way  now,  as  if  I  was  a  mad 
dog,  for  I  let  them  have  it  hot  and  heavy  whenever  I've  a 
chance  at  them.^^ 

For  Darwin  in  his  ^^ Descent  of  Man"  he  has 
small  use.  He  seeks  to  controvert  Darwin's  meth- 
ods and  to  oppose  some  of  his  conclusions.  Mr. 
Ruskin 's  interpretations  in  science  are  to  be  re- 
ceived as  of  slight  worth.  But  he  does  believe  in 
the  value  of  local  natural  history  as  a  means  of 
training  students.    He  says: 

Thus,  in  our  simplest  codes  of  school  instruction,  I  hope 
some  day  to  see  local  natural  history  assume  a  principal  place, 

""Modern  Painters,"  Vol.  III.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co., 
p.  13. 

""Hortus  Inclusus, "  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  60. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  117 

so  that  our  peasant  children  may  be  taught  the  nature  and 
uses  of  the  herbs  that  grow  in  their  meadows,  and  may  take 
interest  in  observing  and  cherishing,  rather  than  in  hunting 
or  killing,  the  harmless  animals  of  their  country.  Supposing 
it  determined  that  this  local  natural  history  should  be  taught, 
drawing  ought  to  be  used  to  fix  the  attention,  and  test,  while 
it  aided,  the  memory.  *  'Draw  such  and  such  a  flower  in  out- 
line, with  its  bell  towards  you.  Draw  it  with  its  side  towards 
you.  Paint  the  spots  upon  it.  Draw  a  duck's  head — her 
foot.  Now  a  robin's, — a  thrush's, — now  the  spots  upon  the 
thrush's  breast."  These  are  the  kind  of  tasks  which  it  seems 
to  me  should  be  set  to  the  young  peasant  student.*" 

It  is  also  good  to  be  able  to  say  that  the  teaching 
of  English  our  author  regards  as  a  mighty  force 
in  education.  It  is  a  happy  condition  that  one 
whose  books  have  become  standard  texts  as  exam- 
ples of  good  English  and  as  means  for  the  teaching 
of  English  should  include,  in  the  content  of  educa- 
tion, composition  in  English,  and  in  other  lan- 
guages. A  school  of  literature  he  would  found 
which  should  be  occupied  largely  with  hmnan  emo- 
tion and  history.  The  human  emotion  should  nor- 
mally be  found  in  literature.    Mr.  Ruskin  says : 

There  are  attractive  qualities  in  Burns,  and  attractive  quali- 
ties in  Dickens,  which  neither  of  those  writers  would  have  pos- 
sessed if  the  one  had  been  educated,  and  the  other  had  been 
studying  higher  nature  than  that  of  cockney  London;  but 

*»"A  J07  Forever,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  252. 


118  EDUCATION 

those  attractive  qualities  are  not  such  as  we  should  seek  in 
a  school  of  literature.  If  we  want  to  teach  young  men  a  good 
manner  of  writing,  we  should  teach  it  from  Shakespeare, — not 
from  Burns;  from  Walter  Scott, — and  not  from  Dickens.^^ 

The  value  of  drawing  is  constantly  referred  to 
under  divers  forms,  and  with  great  emphasis,  in  all 
of  Mr.  Euskin's  works.  I  might  refer  to  many- 
pages,  but  I  content  myself  with  the  simple  declara- 
tion. 

This  tremendous  force  called  education  is  one 
devoted  to  the  enlargement  and  enrichment  of  every 
faculty  both  of  the  race  and  of  the  individuals  com- 
posing the  race.  It  is  not  a  force  flung  into  the 
air,  or  hidden  in  the  depths  of  the  sea  or  of  the  land. 
It  has  a  human  application,  yet  it  has  a  relationship 
to  the  natural  elements  and  the  environments 
which  help  to  make  man  what  he  is.  This  value  of 
environment  is  illustrated  in  a  personal  letter  writ- 
ten in  1871,  published  as  Letter  Ten  in  the  first 
volume  of  *'Fors.'' 

It  happened  also,  which  was  the  real  cause  of  the  bias  of 
my  after  life,  that  my  father  had  a  rare  love  of  pictures.  I 
use  the  word  "rare"  advisedly,  having  never  met  with  an- 
other instance  of  so  innate  a  faculty  for  the  discernment  of 
true  art,  up  to  the  point  possible  without  actual  practice. 

«"Two  Paths  on  Art,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  p.  44. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  119 

Accordingly,  wherever  there  was  a  gallery  to  be  seen,  we 
stopped  at  the  nearest  town  for  the  night;  and  in  reverentest 
manner  I  thus  saw  nearly  all  the  noblemen's  houses  in  Eng- 
land; not  indeed  myself  at  that  age  caring  for  the  pictures, 
but  much  for  castles  and  ruins,  feeling  more  and  more,  as 
I  grew  older,  the  healthy  delight  of  uncovetous  admiration, 
and  perceiving,  as  soon  as  I  could  perceive  any  political  truth 
at  all,  that  it  was  probably  much  happier  to  live  in  a  small 
house,  and  have  Warwick  Castle  to  be  astonished  at,  than  to 
live  in  Warwick  Castle,  and  have  nothing  to  be  astonished 
at;  but  that,  at  all  events,  it  would  not  make  Brunswick 
Square  in  the  least  more  pleasantly  habitable,  to  pull  War- 
wick Castle  down.  And,  at  this  day,  though  I  have  kind 
invitations  enough  to  visit  America,  I  could  not,  even  for  a 
couple  of  months,  live  in  a  country  so  miserable  as  to  possess 
no  castles.*^ 

But  aside  from  environment  and  natural  ele- 
ments, education  is  above  all  else  a  process  to  be 
applied,  as  I  have  said,  to  the  race  and  to  individ- 
uals. 

Observe:  I  do  not  say,  nor  do  I  believe,  that  the  lower 
classes  ought  not  to  be  better  educated,  in  millions  of  ways, 
than  they  are.  I  believe  every  man  m  a  Christian  kingdom 
ought  to  he  equally  well  educated.  But  I  would  have  it  edu- 
cation to  purpose ;  stern,  practical,  irresistible,  in  moral  habits, 
in  bodily  strength  and  beauty,  in  all  faculties  of  mind  capable 
of  being  developed  under  the  circumstances  of  the  individual, 

*»"For8  Clavigera,"  Vol.  I.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Bates  &  Co.,  p. 
132. 


120  EDUCATION 

and  especially  in  the  technical  knowledge  of  his  own  busi- 
ness ;  but  yet,  infinitely  various  in  its  effort,  directed  to  make 
one  youth  humble,  and  another  confident ;  to  tranquillize 
this  mind,  to  put  some  spark  of  ambition  into  that;  now  to 
urge,  and  now  to  restrain:  and  in  the  doing  of  all  this,  con- 
sidering knowledge  as  one  only  out  of  myriads  of  means 
in  its  hands,  or  myriads  of  gifts  at  its  disposal;  and  giving 
it  or  withholding  it  as  a  good  husbandman  waters  his  garden, 
giving  the  full  shower  only  to  the  thirsty  plants  and  at  times 
when  they  are  thirsty,  whereas  at  present  we  pour  it  upon 
the  heads  of  our  youth  as  the  snow  falls  on  the  Alps,  on  one 
and  another  alike,  till  they  can  bear  no  more,  and  then  take 
honor  to  ourselves  because  here  and  there  a  river  descends 
from  their  crests  into  the  valleys,  not  observing  that  we  have 
made  the  loaded  hills  themselves  barren  for  ever. 

Finally ;  I  hold  it  for  indisputable,  that  the  first  duty  of  a 
state  is  to  see  that  every  child  born  therein  shall  be  well 
housed,  clothed,  fed,  and  educated,  till  it  attain  years  of 
discretion.*' 

It  is  througli  this  education  of  the  individual 
that  he  is  strengthened  in  right  choices,  enlarged 
in  intellect,  made  purer  in  heart  and  more  divine 
in  his  entire  character.  His  capacity  and  final 
effectiveness  are  determined  at  birth ;  yet  education 
transmutes  possibilities  into  actualities.  This  mod- 
ern truth  Mr.  Ruskin  expresses  in  ''Modern  Paint- 
ers" in  saying: 

«" stones  of  Venice,"  Vol.  III.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co., 
p.  222. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  121 

I  know  well  the  common  censure  by  which  objections  to  such 
futilities  of  so-called  education  are  met,  by  the  men  who  have 
been  ruined  by  them, — the  common  plea  that  anything  does 
to  "exercise  the  mind  upon."  It  is  an  utterly  false  one.  The 
human  soul,  in  youth,  is  not  a  machine  of  which  you  can 
polish  the  cogs  with  any  kelp  or  brick-dust  near  at  hand ; 
and,  having  got  it  into  working  order,  and  good,  empty, 
and  oiled  serviceableness,  start  your  immortal  locomotive  at 
twenty-five  years  old  or  thirty,  express  from  the  Strait  Gate, 
on  the  Narrow  Road.  The  whole  period  of  youth  is  one  essen- 
tially of  formation,  edification,  instruction,  I  use  the  words 
with  their  weight  in  them ;  in  taking  of  stores,  establishment 
in  vital  habits,  hopes,  and  faiths.  There  is  not  an  hour  of 
it  but  is  trembling  with  destinies, — not  a  moment  of  which, 
once  past,  the  appointed  work  can  ever  be  done  again,  or 
the  neglected  blow  struck  on  the  cold  iron.  Take  your  vase 
of  Venice  glass  out  of  the  furnace,  and  strew  chaff  over  it 
in  its  transparent  heat,  and  recover  that  to  its  clearness  and 
rubied  glory  when  the  north  wind  has  blown  upon  it;  but  do 
not  think  to  strew  chaff  over  the  child  fresh  from  God's 
presence,  and  to  bring  the  heavenly  colors  back  to  him — at 
least  in  this  world.** 

The  race  does  indeed  need  education  as  lie  lias 
well  said  in  ** Stones  of  Venice:" 

It  seems  to  me,  then,  that  the  whole  human  race,  so  far 
as  their  own  reason  can  be  trusted,  may  at  present  be  re- 
garded as  just  emergent  from  childhood;  and  beginning  for 
the  first  time  to  feel  their  strength,  to  stretch  their  limbs, 

*♦" Modem  Painters,"  Vol.  IV.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Bates  &  Co., 
p.  497. 


122  EDUCATION 

and  explore  the  creation  around  them.  If  we  consider  that, 
till  within  the  last  fifty  years,  the  nature  of  the  ground  we 
tread  on,  of  the  air  we  breathe,  and  of  the  light  by  which  we 
see,  were  not  so  much  as  conjecturally  conceived  by  us;  that 
the  duration  of  the  globe,  and  the  races  of  animal  life  by 
which  it  was  inhabited,  are  just  beginning  to  be  apprehended ; 
and  that  the  scope  of  the  magnificent  science  which  has  re- 
vealed them,  is  as  yet  so  little  received  by  the  public  mind, 
that  presumption  and  ignorance  are  still  permitted  to  raise 
their  voices  against  it  unrebuked ;  that  perfect  veracity  in  the 
representation  of  general  nature  by  art  has  never  been  at- 
tempted until  the  present  day,  and  has  in  the  present  day 
been  resisted  with  all  the  energy  of  the  popular  voice;  that 
the  simplest  problems  of  social  science  are  yet  so  little  under- 
stood, as  that  doctrines  of  liberty  and  equality  can  be  openly 
preached,  and  so  successfully  as  to  affect  the  whole  body 
of  the  civilized  world  with  apparently  incurable  disease ;  that 
the  first  principles  of  commerce  were  acknowledged  by  the 
English  Parliament  only  a  few  months  ago,  in  its  free  trade 
measures,  and  are  still  so  little  understood  by  the  million, 
that  no  nation  dares  abolish  its  custom-houses;  that  the  sim- 
plest principles  of  policy  are  still  not  so  much  as  stated,  far 
less  received,  and  that  civilized  nations  persist  in  the  belief 
that  the  subtlety  and  dishonesty  which  they  know  to  be  ruin- 
ous in  dealings  between  man  and  man,  are  serviceable  in  deal- 
ings between  multitude  and  multitude ;  finally,  that  the  scope 
of  the  Christian  religion,  which  we  have  been  taught  for  two 
thousand  years,  is  still  so  little  conceived  by  us,  that  we  sup- 
pose the  laws  of  charity  and  of  self-sacrifice  bear  upon  indi- 
viduals in  all  their  social  relations,  and  yet  do  not  bear 
upon  nations  in  any  of  their  political  relations ; — when,  I  say, 
we  thus  review  the  depth  of  simplicity  in  which  the  human 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  123 

race  are  still  plunged  with  respect  to  all  that  it  most  pro- 
foundly concerns  them  to  know,  and  which  might,  by  them, 
with  most  ease  have  been  ascertained,  we  can  hardly  deter- 
mine how  far  back  on  the  narrow  path  of  human  progre^5S 
we  ought  to  place  the  generation  to  which  we  belong,  how  far 
the  swaddling  clothes  are  unwound  from  us,  and  childish 
things  beginning  to  be  put  away.*' 

Much  that  has  been  said  of  education  according 
to  John  Ruskin  receives  either  illustration  or  em- 
phasis in  the  account  he  himself  gives  of  his  own 
education,  in  his  autobiographic  ^'Praeterita.'^ 
From  this  interpretation  I  select  a  few  of  the  more 
pregnant  paragraphs : 

And  for  best  and  truest  beginning  of  all  blessings,  I  had 
been  taught  the  perfect  meaning  of  Peace,  in  thought,  act, 
and  word.  .  .  . 

Next  to  this  quite  priceless  gift  of  Peace,  I  had  received 
the  perfect  understanding  of  the  natures  of  Obedience  and 
Faith.  I  obeyed  word,  or  lifted  finger,  of  father  or  mother, 
simply  as  a  ship  her  helm;  not  only  without  idea  of  resist- 
ance, but  receiving  the  direction  as  a  part  of  my  own  life 
and  force,  a  helpful  law,  as  necessary  to  me  in  every  moral 
action  as  the  law  of  gravity  in  leaping.  And  my  practice  in 
Faith  was  soon  complete :  nothing  was  ever  promised  me  that 
was  not  given;  nothing  ever  threatened  me  that  was  not  in- 
flicted, and  nothing  ever  told  me  that  was  not  true. 

Peace,  obedience,  faith ;  these  three  for  chief  good ;  next  to 

•"Stones  of  Venice,"  VoL  III.,  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co., 
p.  167. 


124  EDUCATION 

these,  the  habit  of  fixed  attention  with  both  eyes  and  mind — 
on  which  I  will  not  further  enlarge  at  this  moment,  this  being 
the  main  practical  faculty  of  my  life,  causing  Mazzini  to 
say  of  me,  in  conversation  authentically  reported,  a  year  or 
two  before  his  death,  that  I  had  **the  most  analytic  mind 
in  Europe. ' '  An  opinion  in  which,  so  far  as  I  am  acquainted 
with  Europe,  I  am  myself  entirely  disposed  to  concur. 

Lastly,  an  extreme  perfection  in  palate  and  all  other  bodily 
senses,  given  by  the  utter  prohibition  of  cake,  wine,  comfits, 
or,  except  in  caref ullest  restriction,  fruit ;  and  by  fine  prepa- 
ration of  what  food  was  given  me.  Such  I  esteem  the  main 
blessings  of  my  childhood; — next,  let  me  count  the  equally 
dominant  calamities. 

First,  that  I  had  nothing  to  love. 

My  parents  were — in  a  sort — visible  powers  of  nature  to 
me,  no  more  loved  than  the  sun  and  the  moon :  only  I  should 
have  been  annoyed  and  puzzled  if  either  of  them  had  gone 
out;  (how  much,  now,  when  both  are  darkened!) — still  less 
did  I  love  God ;  not  that  I  had  any  quarrel  with  Him,  or  fear 
of  Him ;  but  simply  found  what  people  told  me  was  His  serv- 
ice, disagreeable ;  and  what  people  told  me  was  His  book,  not 
entertaining.  I  had  no  companions  to  quarrel  with,  neither; 
nobody  to  assist,  and  nobody  to  thank.  Not  a  servant  was 
ever  allowed  to  do  anything  for  me,  but  what  it  was  their  duty 
to  do;  and  why  should  I  have  been  grateful  to  the  cook  for 
cooking,  or  the  gardener  for  gardening, — ^when  the  one  dared 
not  give  me  a  baked  potato  without  asking  leave,  and  the 
other  would  not  let  my  ants'  nests  alone,  because  they  made 
the  walks  untidy?  The  evil  consequence  of  all  this  was  not, 
however,  what  might  perhaps  have  been  expected,  that  I  grew 
up  selfish  or  unaffectionate ;  but  that,  when  affection  did 
come,  it  came  with  violence  utterly  rampant  and  unmanage- 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  125 

able,  at  least  by  me,  who  never  before  had  anything  to 
manage. 

For  (second  of  chief  calamities)  I  had  nothing  to  endure. 
Danger  or  pain  of  any  kind  I  knew  not:  my  strength  was 
never  exercised,  my  patience  never  tried,  and  my  courage 
never  fortified.  Not  that  I  was  ever  afraid  of  anything, — 
either  ghosts,  thunder,  or  beasts;  and  one  of  the  nearest  ap- 
proaches to  insubordination  which  I  was  ever  tempted  into 
as  a  child,  was  in  passionate  effort  to  get  leave  to  play  with 
the  lion's  cubs  in  Wombwell's  menagerie. 

Thirdly.  I  was  taught  no  precision  nor  etiquette  of  man- 
ners; it  was  enough  if,  in  the  little  society  we  saw,  I  re- 
mained unobtrusive,  and  replied  to  a  question  without  shy- 
ness: but  the  shyness  came  later,  and  increased  as  I  grew 
conscious  of  the  rudeness  arising  from  the  want  of  social  dis- 
cipline, and  found  it  impossible  to  acquire,  in  advanced  life, 
dexterity  in  any  bodily  exercise,  skill  in  any  pleasing  accom- 
plishment, or  ease  and  tact  in  ordinary  behavior. 

Lastly,  and  chief  of  evils.  IMy  judgment  of  right  and 
wrong,  and  powers  of  independent  action,  were  left  entirely 
undeveloped;  because  the  bridle  and  blinkers  were  never 
taken  off  me.  Children  should  have  their  times  of  being  off 
duty,  like  soldiers ;  and  when  once  the  obedience,  if  required, 
is  certain,  the  little  creature  should  be  very  early  put  for 
periods  of  practice  in  complete  command  of  itself;  set  on  the 
barebacked  horse  of  its  own  will,  and  left  to  break  it  by  its 
own  strength.  But  the  ceaseless  authority  exercised  over  my 
youth  left  me,  when  cast  out  at  last  into  the  world,  unable 
for  some  time  to  do  more  than  drift  with  its  vortices. 

My  present  verdict,  therefore,  on  the  general  tenor  of  my 
education  at  that  time,  must  be,  that  it  was  at  once  too  formal 
and  too  luxurious;  leaving  my  character,  at  the  most  impor- 


126  EDUCATION 

tant  moment  for  its  construction,  cramped  indeed,  but  not 
disciplined;  and  only  by  protection  innocent,  instead  of  by 
practice  virtuous.  My  mother  saw  this  herself,  and  but  too 
clearly,  in  later  years;  and  whenever  I  did  anything  wrong, 
stupid,  or  hard-hearted, — (and  I  have  done  many  things  that 
were  all  three,) — always  said,  "It  is  because  you  were  too 
much  indulged."^* 

The  comprehensive  conclusion  is : 

Thus,  in  perfect  health  of  life  and  fire  of  heart,  not  want- 
ing to  be  anything  but  the  boy  I  was,  not  wanting  to  have 
anything  more  than  I  had;  knowing  of  sorrow  only  just  so 
much  as  to  make  life  serious  to  me,  not  enough  to  slacken 
in  the  least  its  sinews;  and  with  so  much  of  science  mixed 
with  feeling  as  to  make  the  sight  of  the  Alps  not  only  the 
revelation  of  the  beauty  of  the  earth,  but  the  opening  of  the 
first  page  of  its  volume, — I  went  down  that  evening  from 
the  garden-terrace  of  Schaffhausen  with  my  destiny  fixed  in 
all  of  it  that  was  to  be  sacred  and  useful.  To  that  terrace, 
and  the  shore  of  the  Lake  of  Geneva,  my  heart  and  faith  re- 
turn to  this  day,  in  every  impulse  that  is  yet  nobly  alive  in 
them,  and  every  thought  that  has  in  it  help  or  peace.*'^ 

A  similar  experience,  and  likewise  far-reaching, 
one  recalls  as  occurring  in  the  life  of  Charles  Kings- 
ley.  Of  Mr.  Ruskin's  life  at  Oxford,  broken  into 
by  his  sickness,  it  is  superfluous  now  to  write.  This 
life  apparently  had  little  influence  over  his  career. 

**"Praeterita,"  Cabinet  Edition,  Dana  Estes  &  Co.,  pp.  38-40. 
"Ibid.,  p.  98. 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  127 

He  finally  took  a  ** complimentary  double  fourth." 
His  development  was  slow,  but  he  finally  came  to 
his  large  self. 

I  have  no  space  in  this  story  to  describe  the  advantages  I 
never  used ;  nor  does  my  own  failure  give  rae  right  to  blame, 
even  were  there  any  use  in  blaming,  a  system  now  passed 
away.  Oxford  taught  me  as  much  Greek  and  Latin  as  she 
could;  and  though  I  think  she  might  also  have  told  me  that 
fritillaries  grew  in  Iffley  meadow,  it  was  better  that  she  left 
me  to  find  them  for  myself,  than  that  she  should  have  told 
me,  as  nowadays  she  would,  that  the  painting  on  them  was 
only  to  amuse  the  midges.  For  the  rest,  the  whole  time  I 
was  there,  my  mind  was  simply  in  the  state  of  a  squash 
before  'tis  a  peascod, — and  remained  so  yet  a  year  or  two 
afterward,  I  grieve  to  say; — so  that  for  any  account  of  my 
real  life,  the  gossip  hitherto  given  to  its  codling  or  cocoon 
condition  has  brought  us  but  a  little  way.  I  must  get  on  to 
the  days  of  opening  sight,  and  effective  labor;  and  to  the 
scenes  of  nobler  education  which  all  men,  who  keep  their 
hearts  open,  receive  in  the  End  of  Days.** 

As  one  reviews  all  that  Mr.  Ruskin  wrote 
through  a  half -century,  and  under  diverse  condi- 
tions, on  education,  the  question  emerges:  What 
was  the  worthiest  contribution  which  he  made  to 
the  great  cause,  and  what,  if  any,  was  the  defect  or 
weakness  in  his  offering  ?  The  answer  is  not  far  to 
seek.    Mr.  Ruskin 's  chief  contribution  lies  in  the 

-Jhid.,  p.  210. 


128  EDUCATION 

emphasis  he  placed  on,  and  in  the  analyses  he  made 
of,  the  moral  element  in  character  and  training. 

By  the  moral  element  one  does  not  mean  merely 
the  ethical  virtues,  either  major  or  minor,  although 
they  are  included.  One  does  have  in  mind  those 
parts  of  character  which  are  primarily  spiritual 
or  non-intellectual.  Perhaps  no  better  single  illus- 
tration or  example  could  be  found  than  that  which 
is  furnished  by  the  Beatitudes  of  Christ.  The  love 
for,  and  the  making  of  peace,  mercy,  purity  of 
heart,  meekness,  are  the  supreme  qualities  which 
he  holds  most  dear.  Obedience,  faith,  gentleness, 
charity,  are  words  which  drop  from  his  pen  like 
dew  from  the  summer  skies.  To  him,  cruelty  and 
idleness  are  abominable.  Like  St.  John,  he  is  an 
apostle  of  and  to  the  heart.  His  seven  lamps  of 
architecture  are  the  lights  which  illumine  every 
human  path.  The  stones  of  the  city  which  he  most 
adores  are  laid  with  the  fair  colors  of  goodness 
and  tenderness  and  love. 

Of  such  interpretation  and  of  such  emphasis 
there  is  abundant  need.  In  an  age  which  delights 
to  call  itself  dynamic,  and  whose  emblem  is  either 
an  electric  bulb  or  a  gas-engine,  placed  in  an  auto- 
mobile, it  is  good  to  find  accent  put  on  qualities 
which  are  neither  splendid  nor  meretricious  nor 


ACCORDING  TO  RUSKIN  129 

crass.  It  is  indeed  good  to  find  the  Divine  Spirit 
not  in  the  whirlwind  or  the  thunder,  but  in  the 
still,  small  voice. 

This  emphasis  on  the  moral  side  also  points  out 
the  defect  of  his  theory,  as  a  shadow  follows  the 
light.  The  defect  lies  in  the  lack  of  proper  atten- 
tion to  the  strictly  intellectual  side  of  education. 
Although  the  intellect  is  a  less  important  tool  in 
human  progress  than  is  supposed  by  most  men,  it 
does  have  its  great  and  unique  place.  Ruskin^s 
own  desultory  and  broken  course  of  education  un- 
consciously affects  his  theories.  The  scientific  type 
of  mind  he  contemns.  Of  the  masters  in  philoso- 
phy, as  Kant,  he  has  slight  knowledge.  For  the 
clear  light  of  truth  without  shadow  or  turning,  free 
from  prejudice  and  devoid  of  passion,  his  mind  has 
slight  afl&nity.  He  interprets  quite  as  much  with 
the  heart  as  with  the  brain.  To  think  (although 
he  declares  he  wishes  to  be  known  as  a  thinker), 
to  reason,  to  judge,  to  weigh  evidence,  he  lacked  a 
worthy  and  adequate  power,  even  with  aU  his 
unique  and  tremendously  great  gifts. 

For  two  of  his  own  great  contemporaries,  John 
Stuart  Mill  and  Charles  Darwin,  he  has  either  deri- 
sion or  sarcasm.  Next  to  Turner,  the  most  out- 
standing object  of  his  admiration  is  Thomas  Car- 


130  EDUCATION 

lyle.  He  prefers  the  pre-Kaphaelites  to  Raphael, 
and  Bume-Jones  to  Michael  Angelo.  His  judg- 
ment of  personalities  interprets  his  own  person- 
ality, and  helps  to  determine  the  worth  of  his  inter- 
pretation of  education. 


IV 

EDUCATION  ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUAET  MILL 

THE  men  who  were  the  leaders  of  thought  and 
action  in  England  between  the  passage  of 
the  Refonn  Bill  of  1832  and  the  passage  of  the 
Education  Bill  of  1870,  were  the  ablest  of  all  who 
have  lived  since  the  great  company  of  those  who 
flourished  in  the  reign  of  Henry  VIII.  and  of 
Elizabeth.  This  large  circle  includes  Peel, 
Pahnerston,  Cobden,  Brougham,  Disraeli,  Glad- 
stone, Macaulay,  Coleridge,  Wordsworth,  Brown- 
ing, Tennyson,  Darwin,  Huxley  and  Spencer.  In 
this  group,  John  Stuart  Mill  has  a  unique  place. 
Whether  that  place  is  large  or  small — and  most 
would  agree  in  thinking  it  is  large — it  is  certainly 
a  place  unique  in  its  breadth  and  intensity  of 
influence.  Herbert  Spencer  said  of  Mill  that 
**  during  a  considerable  period  his  had  been  the 
one  conspicuous  figure  in  the  higher  regions  of 
thought.  So  great,  indeed,  was  his  influence  that 
during  the  interval  between,  say  1840  and  1860,  few 

131 


132  EDUCATION 

dared  to  call  his  views  in  question/'  *  To  tlie  three 
great  provinces  of  economics,  inductive  logic  and 
of  political  science,  he  made  rich  contributions. 

Yet  in  a  smaller  circle,  and  not  unworthy.  Mill 
fills  a  place  also  central  and  commanding.  This 
circle  was  likewise  impressive.  It  included  Car- 
lyle,  Ruskin,  Bentham,  George  Grote,  his  early 
friend  for  whom  he  pronounced  a  *^ well-done''  in 
his  review  of  Aristotle,  the  Austins,  Ricardo,  Mau- 
rice, the  thinker,  John  Sterling,  the  poet,  and  his 
own  father.  Mill  was  the  worthy  son  of  his  father, 
for,  as  Bain  says  in  the  biography  of  the  father, 
that 

His  Intellectual  powers  were  of  a  high  order  is  attested 
by  the  work  that  he  achieved.  That  his  special  characteristics 
were  such  as  we  denominate  by  the  terms  scientific  and  logical, 
is  also  apparent.  His  training  in  science  was  not  even  the 
highest  that  the  time  could  have  permitted;  he  had,  never- 
theless, imbibed  the  scientific  methods  to  a  degree  beyond  most 
of  the  professed  votaries  of  science.  In  other  words,  he  had 
thoroughly  mastered  Evidence,  and  aU  the  processes  sub- 
servient thereto.  His  training  was  aided  by  the  old  logicians, 
and  by  the  best  models  of  clear  reasoning  that  the  philo- 
sophical literature  of  the  past  could  afford.^ 

The  exceptional  place  which  Mill  held  in  this 
group,  small  in  numbers,  but  great  in  weight,  is 

*  Herbert  Spencer 's  Autobiography,  Vol.  II.,  p.  289. 
•Bain's  ''James  MiU,"  p.  420. 


AXJCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    133 

intimated  by  the  interpretation  made  by  one  of  the 

younger  members,  the  only  one  still  surviving.    In 

writing  of  the  death  of  Mill,  John  Morley  says : 

Even  those  whom  Mr.  Mill  honoured  with  his  friendship, 
and  who  must  always  bear  to  his  memory  the  affectionate  ven- 
eration of  sons,  may  yet  feel  their  pain  at  the  thought  that 
they  will  see  him  no  more,  raised  into  a  higher  mood  as  they 
meditate  on  the  loftiness  of  his  task  and  the  steadfastness 
and  success  with  which  he  achieved  it.  If  it  is  grievous  to 
think  that  such  richness  of  culture,  such  full  maturity  of  wis- 
dom, such  passion  for  truth  and  justice,  are  now  by  a  single 
stroke  extinguished,  at  least  we  may  find  some  not  unworthy 
solace  in  the  thought  of  the  splendid  purpose  that  they  have 
served  in  keeping  alive,  and  surrounding  with  new  attractions, 
the  diflScult  tradition  of  patient  and  accurate  thinking  in 
union  with  unselfish  and  magnanimous  living.' 

Morley  also  says  that  with  his  reputation  will 
stand  or  fall  the  intellectual  repute  of  a  whole 
generation  of  his  countrymen.  The  most  eminent 
of  those  who  are  now  so  fast  becoming  the  front 
line,  as  death  mows  down  the  veterans,  bear  traces 
of  his  influence,  whether  they  are  avowed  disciples 
or  avowed  opponents.  For  a  score  of  years  no 
one  at  all  open  to  serious  intellectual  impressions 
left  Oxford  without  being  touched  by  the  influence 
of  Mr.  Mill's  teaching.  Yet  it  would  be  too  much 
to  say  that  in  that  temple  where  they  are  ever 

•John  Morley 's  "Critical  Miscellanies,"  VoL  III.,  p.  38. 


134  EDUCATION 

burnishing  new  idols,  his  throne  is  still  unshaken.  The  pro- 
fessorial chairs  there  and  elsewhere  are  more  and  more  be- 
ing filled  with  men  whose  minds  have  been  trained  in  his  prin- 
ciples. The  universities  only  typify  his  influence  on  the  less 
learned  part  of  the  world.  The  better  sort  of  journalists 
educated  themselves  on  his  books,  and  even  the  baser  sort 
acquired  a  habit  of  quoting  from  them.  He  is  the  only  writer 
in  the  world  whose  treatises  on  highly  abstract  subjects  have 
been  printed  during  his  lifetime  in  editions  for  the  people, 
and  sold  at  the  price  of  railway  novels.* 

Of  him,  directly  upon  his  death,  Carlyle  said  to 
Charles  Eliot  Norton : 

I  never  knew  a  finer,  tenderer,  more  sensitive  or  modest 
soul  among  the  sons  of  men.' 

Such  were  some  of  the  circumstances  attending 
the  life  of  John  Stuart  Mill.  Such  also  were  cer- 
tain of  the  personalities  whom  he  influenced  and 
who  influenced  him.  And  such  are  something  of 
the  intimations  of  the  worth  of  his  rich  service  to 
humanity. 

His  own  education  was  unique.  His  father  was 
his  teacher.  Never  was  a  father  more  richly  blessed 
in  a  son  of  his  intellectual,  as  well  as  of  his  physical, 
loins.  His  own  education  he  has  described  in  many 
pages  which  should  be  quoted  at  length. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  39. 

•"Letters  of  Charles  EUot  Norton,"  Vol.  L,  p.  495. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    135 

I  have  no  remembrance  of  the  time  when  I  began  to  learn 
Greek,  I  have  been  told  that  it  was  when  I  was  three  years 
old.  My  earliest  recollection  on  the  subject,  is  that  of  com- 
mitting to  memory  what  my  father  termed  vocables,  being  lists 
of  common  Greek  words,  with  their  signification  in  English, 
which  he  wrote  out  for  me  on  cards.  Of  grammar,  until  some 
years  later,  I  learnt  no  more  than  the  inflexions  of  the  nouns 
and  verbs,  but,  after  a  course  of  vocables,  proceeded  at  once 
to  translation;  and  I  faintly  remember  going  through  .^sop's 
Fables,  the  first  Greek  book  which  I  read.  The  Anabasis, 
which  I  remember  better,  was  the  second.  I  learnt  no  Latin 
until  my  eighth  year.  At  that  time  I  had  read,  under  my 
father's  tuition,  a  number  of  Greek  prose  authors,  among 
whom  I  remember  the  whole  of  Herodotus,  and  of  Xenophon  's 
Cyropaedia  and  Memorials  of  Socrates;  some  of  the  lives  of 
the  philosophers  by  Diogenes  Laertius;  part  of  Lucian,  and 
Isocrates  ad  Demonicum  and  Ad  Nicoclem.  I  also  read,  in 
1813,  the  first  six  dialogues  (in  the  common  arrangement) 
of  Plato,  from  the  Euthyphron  to  the  Theoctetus  inclusive: 
which  last  dialogue,  I  venture  to  think,  would  have  been  bet- 
ter omitted,  as  it  was  totally  impossible  I  should  understand 
it.  But  my  father,  in  all  his  teaching,  demanded  of  me  not 
only  the  utmost  that  I  could  do,  but  much  that  I  could  by 
no  possibility  have  done.  What  he  was  himself  willing  to 
undergo  for  the  sake  of  my  instruction,  may  be  judged  from 
the  fact,  that  I  went  through  the  whole  process  of  preparing 
my  Greek  lessons  in  the  same  room  and  at  the  same  table 
at  which  he  was  writing:  and  as  in  those  days  Greek  and 
English  lexicons  were  not,  and  I  could  make  no  more  use  of 
a  Greek  and  Latin  lexicon  than  could  be  made  without  having 
yet  begun  to  learn  Latin,  I  was  forced  to  have  recourse  to 
him  for  the  meaning  of  every  word  which  I  did  not  know. 


136  EDUCATION 

This  incessant  interruption,  he,  one  of  the  most  impatient 
of  men,  submitted  to,  and  wrote  under  that  interruption 
several  volumes  of  his  History  and  all  else  that  he  had  to 
write  during  those  years. 

The  only  thing  besides  Greek,  that  I  learnt  as  a  lesson  in 
this  part  of  my  childhood,  was  arithmetic :  this  also  my  father 
taught  me:  it  was  the  task  of  the  evenings,  and  I  well  re- 
member its  disagreeableness.  But  the  lessons  were  only  a  part 
of  the  daily  instruction  I  received.  Much  of  it  consisted  in 
the  books  I  read  by  myself,  and  my  father's  discourses  to  me, 
chiefly  during  our  walks.  From  1810  to  the  end  of  1813 
we  were  living  in  Newington  Green,  then  an  almost  rustic 
neighbourhood.  My  father 's  health  required  considerable  and 
constant  exercise,  and  he  walked  habitually  before  break- 
fast, generally  in  the  green  lanes  towards  Homsey.  In  these 
walks  I  always  accompanied  him,  and  with  my  earliest  recol- 
lections of  green  fields  and  wild  flowers,  is  mingled  that  of 
the  account  I  gave  him  daily  of  what  I  had  read  the  day 
before.  To  the  best  of  my  remembrance,  this  was  a  voluntary 
rather  than  a  prescribed  exercise.  I  made  notes  on  slips  of 
paper  while  reading,  and  from  these  in  the  morning  walks, 
I  told  the  story  to  him;  for  the  books  were  chiefly  histories, 
of  which  I  read  in  this  manner  a  great  number:  Robertson's 
histories,  Hume,  Gibbon;  but  my  greatest  delight,  then  and 
for  long  afterwards,  was  Watson's  Philip  the  Second  and 
Third.  The  heroic  defence  of  the  Knights  of  Malta  against 
the  Turks,  and  of  the  revolted  Provinces  of  the  Netherlands 
against  Spain,  excited  in  me  an  intense  and  lasting  interest. 
Next  to  "Watson,  my  favourite  historical  reading  was  Hooke  's 
History  of  Rome.  Of  Greece  I  had  seen  at  that  time  no  regu- 
lar history,  except  school  abridgments  and  the  last  two  or 
three  volumes  of  a  translation  of  RoUin's  Ancient  History, 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    137 

beginning  with  Philip  of  Macedon.  But  I  read  with  great 
delight  Langhorne's  translation  of  Plutarch.  In  English 
history,  beyond  the  time  at  which  Hume  leaves  off,  I  re- 
member reading  Burnet's  History  of  his  Own  Time,  though 
I  cared  little  for  anything  in  it  except  the  wars  and  battles; 
and  the  historical  part  of  the  "Annual  Register,"  from  the 
beginning  to  about  1788,  where  the  volumes  my  father  bor- 
rowed for  me  from  Mr.  Bentham  left  off.  I  felt  a  lively  in- 
terest in  Frederic  of  Prussia  during  his  difficulties,  and  in 
Paoli,  the  Corsican  patriot ;  but  when  I  came  to  the  American 
war,  I  took  my  part,  like  a  child  as  I  was  (until  set  right 
by  my  father)  on  the  wrong  side,  because  it  was  called  the 
English  side.  In  these  frequent  talks  about  the  books  I  read, 
he  used,  as  opportunity  offered,  to  give  me  explanations  and 
ideas  respecting  civilization,  government,  morality,  mental 
cultivation,  which  he  required  me  afterwards  to  restate  to 
him  in  my  own  words.  He  also  made  me  read,  and  give  him 
a  verbal  account  of,  many  books  which  would  not  have  inter- 
ested me  sufficiently  to  induce  me  to  read  them  of  myself: 
among  others,  Millar's  Historical  View  of  the  English  Gov- 
ernment, a  book  of  great  merit  for  its  time,  and  which  he 
highly  valued;  Mosheim's  Ecclesiastical  History,  McCrie's 
Life  of  John  Knox,  and  even  Sewell  and  Rutty 's  Histories 
of  the  Quakers.  He  was  fond  of  putting  into  my  hands  books 
which  exhibited  men  of  energy  and  resource  in  unusual  cir- 
cumstances, struggling  against  difficulties  and  overcoming 
them:  of  such  works  I  remember  Beaver's  African  Memo- 
randa, and  Collin's  Account  of  the  First  Settlement  of  New 
South  Wales.  Two  books  which  I  never  wearied  of  reading 
were  Anson's  Voyages,  so  delightful  to  most  young  persons, 
and  a  collection  ( Ha wkesworth 's,  I  believe)  of  Voyages 
round  the  World,  in  four  volumes,  beginning  with  Drake 


138  EDUCATION 

and  ending  with  Cook  and  Bougainville.  Of  children's  books, 
any  more  than  of  playthings,  I  had  scarcely  any,  except  an 
occasional  gift  from  a  relation  or  acquaintance :  among  those 
I  had,  Robinson  Crusoe  was  preeminent,  and  continued  to 
delight  me  through  all  my  boyhood.  It  was  no  part,  however, 
of  my  father's  system  to  exclude  books  of  amusement,  though 
he  allowed  them  very  sparingly.  Of  such  books  he  possessed 
at  that  time  next  to  none,  but  he  borrowed  several  for  me; 
those  which  I  remember  are  the  Arabian  Nights,  Cazotte's 
Arabian  Tales,  Don  Quixote,  Miss  Edgeworth  's  Popular  Tales, 
and  a  book  of  some  reputation  in  its  day,  Brooke's  Fool  of 
Quality. 

In  my  eighth  year  I  commenced  learning  Latin,  in  eon- 
junction  with  a  younger  sister,  to  whom  I  taught  it  as  I 
went  on,  and  who  afterwards  repeated  the  lessons  to  my 
father:  and  from  this  time,  other  sisters  and  brothers  being 
successively  added  as  pupils,  a  considerable  part  of  my  day's 
work  consisted  of  this  preparatory  teaching.  It  was  a  part 
which  I  greatly  disliked ;  the  more  so  as  I  was  held  responsible 
for  the  lessons  of  my  pupils,  in  almost  as  full  a  sense  as  for 
my  own:  I,  however,  derived  from  this  discipline  the  great 
advantage,  of  learning  more  thoroughly  and  retaining  more 
lastingly  the  things  which  I  was  set  to  teach :  perhaps,  too,  the 
practice  it  afforded  in  explaining  difficulties  to  others,  may 
even  at  that  age  have  been  useful.  In  other  respects,  the 
experience  of  my  boyhood  is  not  favourable  to  the  plan  of 
teaching  children  by  means  of  one  another.  The  teaching,  I 
am  sure,  is  very  inefficient  as  teaching,  and  I  well  know  that 
the  relation  between  teacher  and  taught  is  not  a  good  moral 
discipline  to  either.  I  went  in  this  manner  through  the 
Latin  grammar,  and  a  considerable  part  of  Cornelius  Nepos 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    139 

and  Cajsar's  Commentaries,  but  afterwards  added  to  the  su- 
perintendence of  these  lessons,  much  longer  ones  of  my  own. 

In  the  same  year  in  which  I  began  Latin,  I  made  my  first 
commencement  in  the  Greek  poets  with  the  Iliad.  After  I 
had  made  some  progress  in  this,  my  father  put  Pope's  transla- 
tion into  my  hands.  It  was  the  first  English  verse  I  had  cared 
to  read,  and  it  became  one  of  the  books  in  which  for  many 
years  I  most  delighted :  I  think  I  must  have  read  it  from 
twenty  to  thirty  times  through.  I  should  not  have  thought 
it  worth  while  to  mention  a  taste  apparently  so  natural  to 
boyhood,  if  I  had  not,  as  I  think,  observed  that  the  keen  en- 
joyment of  this  brilliant  specimen  of  narrative  and  versifica- 
tion is  not  so  universal  with  boys,  as  I  should  have  expected 
both  o  priori  and  from  my  individual  experience.  Soon  after 
this  time  I  commenced  Euclid,  and  somewhat  later.  Algebra, 
still  under  my  father's  tuition. 

From  my  eighth  to  my  twelfth  year,  the  Latin  books  which 
I  remember  reading  were,  the  Bucolics  of  Virgil,  and  the  first 
six  books  of  the  -^Eneid;  all  Horace,  except  the  Epodes;  the 
Fables  of  PhaBdrus ;  the  first  five  books  of  Livy  (to  which  from 
my  love  of  the  subject  I  voluntarily  added,  in  my  hours  of 
leisure,  the  remainder  of  the  first  decade)  ;  all  Sallust;  a  con- 
siderable part  of  Ovid's  Metamorphoses;  some  plays  of  Ter- 
ence ;  two  or  three  books  of  Lucretius ;  several  of  the  Orations 
of  Cicero,  and  of  his  writings  on  oratory;  also  his  letters  to 
Atticus,  my  father  taking  the  trouble  to  translate  to  me  from 
the  French  the  historical  explanations  in  Mingault's  notes. 
In  Greek  I  read  the  Iliad  and  Odyssey  through;  one  or  two 
plays  of  Sophocles,  Euripides,  and  Aristophanes,  though  by 
these  I  profited  little;  all  Thucydides;  the  Hellenics  of 
Xenophon;  a  great  part  of  Demosthenes,  .^chines,  and 
Lysias;   Theocritus;   Anacreon;   part   of  the   Anthology;   a 


140  EDUCATION 

little  of  Dionysius ;  several  books  of  Polybius ;  and  lastly  Aris- 
totle's  Rhetoric,  which,  as  the  first  expressly  scientific  treatise 
on  any  moral  or  psychological  subject  which  I  had  read,  and 
containing  many  of  the  best  observations  of  the  ancients  on 
human  nature  and  life,  my  father  made  me  study  with  pecu- 
liar care,  and  throw  the  matter  of  it  into  synoptic  tables. 
During  the  same  years  I  learnt  elementary  geometry  and 
algebra  thoroughly,  the  differential  calculus,  and  other  por- 
tions of  the  higher  mathematics  far  from  thoroughly :  for  my 
father,  not  having  kept  up  this  part  of  his  early  acquired 
knowledge,  could  not  spare  time  to  qualify  himself  for  remov- 
ing my  difficulties,  and  left  me  to  deal  with  them,  with  little 
other  aid  than  that  of  books:  while  I  was  continually  incur- 
ring his  displeasure  by  my  inability  to  solve  difficult  prob- 
lems for  which  he  did  not  see  that  I  had  not  the  necessary 
previous  knowledge.® 

Such  were  the  beginnings  of  the  education  of  one 
of  the  ablest  intellects.  The  experience  is  quite 
as  pregnant  in  lessons  concerning  the  worth  of 
individuality  of  teaching  as  concerning  the  native 
ability  and  moral  earnestness  of  the  student.  Given 
such  teachers  as  James  Mill,  such  students  as  John 
Stuart  Mill  would  more  frequently  be  made. 
Happy  such  students ;  happy  such  teachers ! 

Regarding  certain  elements  of  his  educative 
process  Mr.  Mill  also  expressed  his  valuation. 

•  Autobiography,  pp.  5  ff. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOIiN  STUART  MILL     141 
In  the  autobiography  he  says: 

My  own  consciousness  and  experience  ultimately  led  me  to 
appreciate  quite  as  highly  as  he  did,  the  value  of  an  early 
practical  familiarity  with  the  school  logic.  I  know  of  noth- 
ing, in  my  education,  to  which  I  think  myself  more  indebted 
for  whatever  capacity  of  thinking  I  have  attained.  The  first 
intellectual  operation  in  which  I  arrived  at  any  proficiency, 
was  dissecting  a  bad  argument,  and  finding  in  what  part  the 
fallacy  lay:  and  though  whatever  capacity  of  this  sort  I 
attained,  was  due  to  the  fact  that  it  was  an  intellectual  exer- 
cise in  which  I  was  most  perseveringly  drilled  by  my  father, 
yet  it  is  also  true  that  the  school  logic,  and  the  mental  habits 
acquired  in  studying  it,  were  among  the  principal  instruments 
of  this  drilling.  I  am  persuaded  that  nothing,  in  modem 
education,  tends  so  much,  when  properly  used,  to  form  exact 
thinkers,  who  attach  a  precise  meaning  to  words  and  propo- 
sitions, and  are  not  imposed  on  by  vague,  loose,  or  ambiguous 
terms.  The  boasted  influence  of  mathematical  studies  is  noth- 
ing to  it;  for  in  mathematical  processes,  none  of  the  real 
difficulties  of  correct  ratiocination  occur.  It  is  also  a  study 
peculiarly  adapted  to  an  early  stage  in  the  education  of  philo- 
sophical students,  since  it  does  not  presuppose  the  slow  proc- 
ess of  acquiring,  by  experience  and  reflection,  valuable 
thoughts  of  their  own.  They  may  become  capable  of  dis- 
entangling the  intricacies  of  confused  and  self-contradictory 
thought,  before  their  own  thinking  faculties  are  much  ad- 
vanced ;  a  power  which,  for  want  of  such  discipline,  many 
otherwise  able  men  altogether  lack;  and  when  they  have  to 
answer  opponents,  only  endeavour,  by  such  arguments  as 
they  can  command,  to  support  the  opposite  conclusion, 
scarcely  even  attempting  to  confute  the  reasonings  of  their 


142  EDUCATION 

anteigonists ;  and,  therefore,  at  the  utmost,  leaving  the  ques- 
tion, as  far  as  it  depends  on  argument,  a  balanced  one.' 

But  in  a  more  formal  way  he  also  remarks : 

We  are  far  from  asserting  that  the  dialectic  contests  of 
the  Greeks,  or  the  public  disputations  of  the  Middle  Ages 
which  succeeded  to  them,  had  never  any  but  a  beneficial  effect ; 
that  they  had  not  their  snares  and  their  temptations,  and  that 
the  good  they  effected  might  not  be  still  better  attained  by 
other  means.  But  the  fact  remains  that  no  such  means  have 
been  provided,  and  that  the  old  training  has  disappeared, 
even  from  the  Universities,  without  having  been  replaced 
by  any  other.  There  is  no  reason  why  a  practice  so  useful 
for  the  pursuit  of  truth  should  not  be  employed  when  the 
attainment  of  truth  is  the  sole  object.  We  have  known  this 
most  effectually  done  by  a  set  of  young  students  of  philosophy, 
assembling  on  certain  days  to  read  regularly  through  some 
standard  book  on  psychology,  logic,  or  political  economy; 
suspending  the  reading  whenever  any  one  had  a  difficulty  to 
propound  or  an  idea  to  start,  and  carrying  on  the  discussion 
from  day  to  day,  if  necessary  for  weeks,  until  the  point  raised 
had  been  searched  to  its  inmost  depths,  and  no  difficulty  or 
obscurity  capable  of  removal  by  discussion  remained.  The 
intellectual  training  given  by  these  debates,  and  especially  the 
habit  they  gave  of  leaving  no  dark  corners  unexplored — of 
searching  out  all  the  d  rjoplai,  and  never  passing  over  any 
unsolved  difficulty — has  been  felt,  by  those  who  took  part, 
to  have  been  invaluable  to  them  as  a  mental  discipline.  There 
would  be  nothing  impracticable  in  making  exercises  of  this 
kind  a  standing  element  of  the  course  of  instruction  in  the 
higher  branches  of  knowledge;  if  the  teachers  had  any  per- 

'Ibid.,  p.  19. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    143 

ception  of  the  want  which  such  discussions  would  supply, 
or  thought  it  any  part  of  their  business  to  fonn  thinkers, 
instead  of  "principling"  their  pupils  (as  Locke  expresses 
it)  with  ready-made  knowledge.  But  the  saying  of  James 
Mill,  in  his  essay  on  Education,  is  as  true  now  as  when  it  was 
written — that  even  the  theory  of  education  is  far  behind  the 
progress  of  knowledge,  and  the  practice  lamentably  behind 
even  the  theory.* 

The  worth  of  writing  as  a  part  of  education  Mill 
learned  at  an  early  age.  He  learned,  of  course,  too, 
that  its  worth  lay  quite  entirely  in  the  activity  of 
the  intellect  devoted  to  the  writing. 

In  the  summer  of  1822  I  wrote  my  first  argumentative 
essay.  I  remember  very  little  about  it,  except  that  it  was 
an  attack  on  what  I  regarded  as  the  aristocratic  prejudice, 
that  the  rich  were,  or  were  likely  to  be,  superior  in  moral 
qualities  to  the  poor.  My  performance  was  entirely  argu- 
mentative, without  any  of  the  declamation  which  the  subject 
would  admit  of,  and  might  be  expected  to  suggest  to  a  young 
writer.  In  that  department  however  I  was,  and  remained, 
very  inapt.  Dry  argument  was  the  only  thing  I  could  manage, 
or  willingly  attempted;  though  passively  I  was  very  sus- 
ceptible to  the  effect  of  all  composition,  whether  in  the  form 
of  poetry  or  oratory,  which  appealed  to  the  feelings  on  any 
basis  of  reason.  My  father,  who  knew  nothing  of  this  essay 
until  it  was  finished,  was  well  satisfied,  and  as  I  learnt  from 
others,  even  pleased  with  it;  but,  perhaps  from  a  desire  to 
promote  the  exercise  of  other  mental  faculties  than  the  purely 
logical,  he  advised  me  to  make  my  next  exercise  in  composi- 

•" Dissertations  and  Discussions,"  Vol.  V.,  p.  212. 


144  EDUCATION 

tion  one  of  the  oratorical  kind :  on  which  suggestion,  availing 
myself  of  my  familiarity  with  Greek  history  and  ideas  and  with 
the  Athenian  orators,  I  wrote  two  speeches,  one  an  accusation, 
the  other  a  defence  of  Pericles,  on  a  supposed  impeachment 
for  not  marching  out  to  fight  the  Lacedemonians  on  their  in- 
vasion of  Attica.  After  this  I  continued  to  write  papers  on 
subjects  often  very  much  beyond  my  capacity,  but  with  great 
benefit  both  from  the  exercise  itself,  and  from  the  discussions 
which  it  led  to  with  my  father.^ 

Mill  also  at  an  early  age  had  been  accustomed, 
under  his  father's  criticism,  to  make  abstracts, 
which  he  believes  to  be  of  much  value  in  compell- 
ing exactness  in  thinking  and  in  expression. 

Mill  in  several  ways  and  under  many  forms  in- 
dicates his  assent  to  the  theory  which  makes  educa- 
tion consist  in  training  rather  than  in  the  accumula- 
tion of  knowledge.  His  conception  is  that  the  en- 
gine, and  not  the  storehouse,  is  the  proper  educa- 
tional sjrmbol. 

Most  boys  or  youths  who  have  had  much  knowledge  drilled 
into  them,  have  their  mental  capacities  not  strengthened,  but 
overlaid  by  it.  They  are  crammed  with  mere  facts,  and  with 
the  opinions  or  phrases  of  other  people,  and  these  are  accepted 
as  a  substitute  for  the  power  to  form  opinions  of  their  own: 
and  thus  the  sons  of  eminent  fathers,  who  have  spared  no 
pains  in  their  education,  so  often  grow  up  mere  parroters  of 
what  they  have  learnt,  incapable  of  using  their  minds  except 

•Autobiography,  p.  71. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    145 

in  the  furrows  traced  for  them.  Mine,  however,  was  not  an 
education  of  cram.  My  father  never  permitted  anything 
which  I  learnt  to  degenerate  into  a  mere  exercise  of  memory. 
He  strove  to  make  the  understanding  not  only  go  along  with 
every  step  of  the  teaching,  but,  if  possible,  precede  it.  Any- 
thing which  could  be  found  out  by  thinking  I  never  was  told, 
until  I  had  exhausted  my  efforts  to  find  it  out  for  myself. 
As  far  a.s  I  can  trust  my  remembrance,  I  acquitted  myself 
very  lamely  in  this  department;  my  recollection  of  such  mat- 
ters is  almost  wholly  of  failures,  hardly  ever  of  success.  It 
is  true  the  failures  were  often  in  things  in  which  success  in 
so  early  a  stage  of  my  progress,  was  almost  impossible.  I 
remember  at  some  time  in  my  thirteenth  year,  on  my  hap- 
pening to  use  the  word  idea,  he  asked  me  what  an  idea  was; 
and  expressed  some  displeasure  at  my  ineffectual  efforts  to 
define  the  word :  I  recollect  also  his  indignation  at  my  using 
the  common  expression  that  something  was  true  in  theory  but 
required  correction  in  practice;  and  how,  after  making  me 
vainly  strive  to  define  the  word  theory,  he  explained  its  mean- 
ing, and  showed  the  fallacy  of  the  vulgar  form  of  speech 
which  I  had  used;  leaving  me  fully  persuaded  that  in  being 
unable  to  give  a  correct  definition  of  Theory,  and  in  speaking 
of  it  as  something  which  might  be  at  variance  with  practice, 
I  had  shown  unparalleled  ignorance.  In  this  he  seems,  and 
perhaps  was,  very  unreasonable;  but  I  think  only  in  being 
angry  at  my  failure.  A  pupil  from  whom  nothing  is  ever 
demanded  which  he  cannot  do,  never  does  all  he  can." 

Mill  is  a  critic  as  well  as  an  interpreter  of  his 
own  education.  He  is  free  to  point  out  its  weak- 
nesses as  well  as  its  elements  of  strength. 

»/iiA,  p.  31. 


146  EDUCATION 

The  deficiencies  in  my  education  were  principally  in  the 
things  which  boys  learn  from  being  turned  out  to  shift  for 
themselves,  and  from  being  brought  together  in  large  num- 
bers. From  temperance  and  much  walking,  I  grew  up  healthy 
and  hardy,  though  not  muscular;  but  I  could  do  no  feats 
of  skill  or  physical  strength,  and  knew  none  of  the  ordinary 
bodily  exercises.  It  was  not  that  play,  or  time  for  it,  was 
refused  me.  Though  no  holidays  were  allowed,  lest  the  habit 
of  work  should  be  broken,  and  a  taste  for  idleness  acquired, 
I  had  ample  leisure  in  every  day  to  amuse  myself;  but  as  I 
had  no  boy  companions,  and  the  animal  need  of  physical 
activity  was  satisfied  by  walking,  my  amusements,  which  were 
mostly  solitary,  were  in  general,  of  a  quiet,  if  not  a  bookish 
turn,  and  gave  little  stimulus  to  any  other  kind  even  of  men- 
tal activity  than  that  which  was  already  called  forth  by  my 
studies:  I  consequently  remained  long,  and  in  a  less  degree 
have  always  remained,  inexpert  in  anything  requiring  manual 
dexterity;  my  mind,  as  well  as  my  hands,  did  its  work  very 
lamely  when  it  was  applied,  or  ought  to  have  been  applied, 
to  the  practical  details  which,  as  they  are  the  chief  interest 
of  life  to  the  majority  of  men,  are  also  the  things  in  which 
whatever  mental  capacity  they  have,  chiefly  shows  itself:  I 
was  constantly  meriting  reproof  by  inattention,  inobservance, 
and  general  slackness  of  mind  in  matters  of  daily  life.  My 
father  was  the  extreme  opposite  in  these  particulars:  his 
senses  and  mental  faculties  were  always  on  the  alert;  he  car- 
ried decision  and  energy  of  character  in  his  whole  manner 
and  into  every  action  of  life:  and  this,  as  much  as  his  tal- 
ents, contributed  to  the  strong  impression  which  he  always 
made  upon  those  with  whom  he  came  into  personal  contact. 
But  the  children  of  energetic  parents,  frequently  grow  up  un- 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    147 

energetic,  because  they  lean  on  their  parents,  and  the  parents 
are  energetic  for  them.  The  education  which  ray  father  gave 
me,  was  in  itself  much  more  fitted  for  training  me  to  know 
than  to  do.  Not  that  he  was  unaware  of  my  deficiencies ;  both 
as  a  boy  and  as  a  youth  I  was  incessantly  smarting  under 
his  severe  admonitions  on  the  subject.  There  was  anything 
but  insensibility  or  tolerance  on  his  part  towards  such  short- 
comings: but,  while  he  saved  me  from  the  demoralizing  effects 
of  school  life,  he  made  no  effort  to  provide  me  with  any  suffi- 
cient substitute  for  its  practicalizing  influences." 

The  conception  which  one  who  suffered  such  an 
education  holds  in  respect  to  the  noimal  elements, 
methods,  forces  and  results  of  education,  cannot 
be  other  than  interesting.  From  education  of  any 
type,  most  men,  even  if  capable  of  receiving  such 
a  type  of  it,  would  finally  and  absolutely  have  re- 
volted. Mill,  on  the  contrary,  not  only  rejoiced  in 
this  type,  but  also,  indirectly  at  least,  and  in  some 
respects,  directly,  has  proved  the  type  to  be  a  minis- 
ter of  the  great  science  and  art  of  intellectual  cul- 
ture. Toleration  was  indeed  a  mark  of  his  charac- 
ter. His  interpretations  of  education  are  of  the 
severe  type  of  which  his  own  training  furnishes  the 
most  illustrious  example.  His  generalizations  are, 
therefore,  of  precious  worth  and  impressiveness. 

In  a  letter  written  in  the  year  1852,  he  says : 

"ibid.,  p.  35. 


148  EDUCATION 

What  the  poor  as  well  as  the  rich  require  is  not  to  be  in- 
doctrinated, is  not  to  be  taught  other  people's  opinions,  but 
to  be  induced  and  enabled  to  think  for  themselves.  It  is  not 
physical  science  that  will  do  this,  even  if  they  could  learn 
it  much  more  thoroughly  than  they  are  able  to  do.  After 
reading,  writing,  and  arithmetic  (the  last  a  most  important 
discipline  in  habits  of  accuracy  and  precision,  in  which  they 
are  extremely  deficient),  the  desirable  thing  for  them  seems 
to  be  the  most  miscellaneous  information,  and  the  most 
varied  exercise  of  their  faculties.  They  cannot  read  too  much. 
Quantity  is  of  more  importance  than  quality,  especially  all 
reading  which  relates  to  human  life  and  the  ways  of  man- 
kind; geography,  voyages  and  travels,  manners  and  customs, 
and  romances,  which  must  tend  to  awaken  their  imagination 
and  give  them  some  of  the  meaning  of  self-devotion  and  hero- 
ism, in  short,  to  unbrutalise  them.  By  such  reading  they 
would  become,  to  a  certain  extent,  cultivated  beings,  which 
they  would  not  become  by  following  out,  even  to  the  great- 
est length,  physical  science.  As  for  education  in  the  best  sense 
of  the  term,  I  fear  they  have  a  long  time  to  wait  for  it.  The 
higher  and  middle  classes  cannot  educate  the  working  classes 
unless  they  are  first  educated  themselves.  The  miserable  pre- 
tence of  education,  which  those  classes  now  receive,  does  not 
form  minds  fit  to  undertake  the  guidance  of  other  minds, 
or  to  exercise  a  beneficent  influence  over  them  by  personal 
contact.  Still,  any  person  who  sincerely  desires  whatever  is 
for  the  good  of  all,  however  it  may  affect  himself  or  his  own 
class,  and  who  regards  the  great  social  questions  as  matters 
of  reason  and  discussion  and  not  as  settled  long  ago,  may,  I 
believe,  do  a  certain  amount  of  good  by  merely  saying  to  the 
working  classes  whatever  he  sincerely  thinks  on  the  subjects 
on  which  they  are  interested.    Free  discussion  with  them  as 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL     149 

equals,  in  speech  and  in  writing,  seems  the  best  instruction 
that  can  be  given  them,  specially  on  social  subjects.^' 

In  the  great  St.  Andrews  address,  one  of  the 
weightiest  educational  addresses  ever  made,  he  also 
says: 

What  professional  men  should  carry  away  with  them  from 
a  University,  is  not  professional  knowledge,  but  that  which 
should  direct  the  use  of  their  professional  knowledge,  and 
bring  the  light  of  general  culture  to  illuminate  the  technicali- 
ties of  a  special  pursuit.  Men  may  be  competent  lawyers 
without  general  education,  but  it  depends  on  general  educa- 
tion to  make  them  philosophic  lawyers — ^who  demand,  and 
are  capable  of  apprehending,  principles,  instead  of  merely 
cramming  their  memory  with  details.  And  so  of  all  other 
useful  pursuits,  mechanical  included.  Education  makes  a 
man  a  more  intelligent  shoemaker,  if  that  be  his  occupa- 
tion, but  not  by  teaching  him  how  to  make  shoes;  it  does 
so  by  the  mental  exercise  it  gives,  and  the  habits  it  impresses. 

This,  then,  is  what  a  mathematician  would  call  the  higher 
limit  of  University  education:  its  province  ends  where  edu- 
cation, ceasing  to  be  general,  branches  off  into  departments 
adapted  to  the  individual's  destination  in  life.  The  lower 
limit  is  more  difficult  to  define.  A  University  is  not  concerned 
with  elementary  instruction:  the  pupil  is  supposed  to  have 
acquired  that  before  coming  here.  But  where  does  elemen- 
tary instruction  end,  and  the  higher  studies  begin?  Some 
have  given  a  very  wide  extension  to  the  idea  of  elementary 
instruction.  According  to  them,  it  is  not  the  office  of  a 
University  to  give  instruction  in  single  branches  of  knowl- 

"" Letters,"  Vol.  I.,  p.  165. 


150  EDUCATION 

edge  from  tlie  commencement.  What  the  pupil  should  be 
taught  here  (they  think),  is  to  methodise  his  knowledge:  to 
look  at  every  separate  part  of  it  in  its  relation  to  the  other 
parts,  and  to  the  whole;  combining  the  partial  glimpses 
which  he  has  obtained  of  the  field  of  human  knowledge  at 
different  points,  into  a  general  map,  if  I  may  so  speak,  of 
the  entire  region;  observing  how  all  knowledge  is  connected, 
how  we  ascend  to  one  branch  by  means  of  another,  how  the 
higher  modifies  the  lower,  and  the  lower  helps  us  to  under- 
stand the  higher;  how  every  existing  reality  is  a  compound 
of  many  properties,  of  which  each  science  or  distinct  mode 
of  study  reveals  but  a  small  part,  but  the  whole  of  which 
must  be  included  to  enable  us  to  know  it  truly  as  a  fact 
in  Nature,  and  not  as  a  mere  abstraction,^^ 

It  is  well,  moreover,  to  use  different  types  of 
education.  These  types  should  be  as  different  as 
are  the  types  of  mind  which  are  to  be  educated, 
and  as  are  the  forms  of  human  service  to  which 
these  same  minds  are  ultimately  to  devote  them- 
selves. In  the  essay  on  *' Liberty"  is  found  an 
application  of  one  of  its  great  principles  to  the 
subject  of  education. 

All  that  has  been  said  of  the  importance  of  individuality 
of  character,  and  diversity  in  opinions  and  modes  of  conduct, 
involves,  as  of  the  same  unspeakable  importance,  diversity 
of  education.  A  general  State  education  is  a  mere  contrivance 
for  moulding  people  to  be  exactly  like  one  another:  and  as 
the  mould  in  which  it  casts  them  is  that  which  pleases  the 

"Eectorial  Addresses,  University  of  St.  Andrews,  p.  21. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    151 

predominant  power  in  the  government,  whether  this  be  a 
monarch,  a  priesthood,  an  aristocracy,  or  tlie  majority  of  the 
existing  generation,  in  proportion  as  it  is  eflRcient  and  suc- 
cessful, it  establishes  a  despotism  over  the  mind,  leading  by 
natural  tendency  to  one  over  the  body.  An  education  es- 
tablished and  controlled  by  the  State,  should  only  exist,  if  it 
exist  at  all,  as  one  among  many  competing  experiments,  car- 
ried on  for  the  purpose  of  example  and  stimulus,  to  keep  the 
others  up  to  a  certain  standard  of  excellence.  Unless,  indeed, 
when  society  in  general  is  in  so  backward  a  state  that  it  could 
not  or  would  not  provide  for  itself  any  proper  institutions  of 
education,  unless  the  government  undertook  the  task;  then, 
indeed,  the  government  may,  as  the  less  of  two  great  evils, 
take  upon  itself  the  business  of  schools  and  universities,  as  it 
may  that  of  joint-stock  companies,  when  private  enterprise, 
in  a  shape  fitted  for  undertaking  great  works  of  industry  does 
not  exist  in  the  country.  But  in  general,  if  the  country  con- 
tains a  sufficient  number  of  persons  qualified  to  provide  edu- 
cation under  government  auspices,  the  same  persons  would 
be  able  and  willing  to  give  an  equally  good  education  on  the 
voluntary  principle,  under  the  assurance  of  remuneration 
afforded  by  a  law  rendering  education  compulsory,  combined 
with  State  aid  to  those  unable  to  defray  the  expense.^* 

In  the  same  impressive  essay  it  is  also  discrimi- 
nated: 

As  much  compression  as  is  necessary  to  prevent  the  stronger 
specimens  of  human  nature  from  encroaching  on  the  rights 
of  others,  cannot  be  dispensed  with;  but  for  this  there  is 
ample  compensation  even  in  the  point  of  view  of  human  de- 

**"0n  Liberty,"  Ticknor  &  Fields,  1863,  p.  205. 


152  EDUCATION 

velopment.  The  means  of  development  which  the  individual 
loses  by  being  prevented  from  gratifying  his  inclinations  to 
the  injury  of  others,  are  chiefly  obtained  at  the  expense  of  the 
development  of  other  people.  And  even  to  himself  there  is 
a  full  equivalent  in  the  better  development  of  the  social  part 
of  his  nature,  rendered  possible  by  the  restraint  put  upon 
the  selfish  part.  To  be  held  to  rigid  rules  of  justice  for  the 
sake  of  others,  develops  the  feelings  and  capacities  which 
have  the  good  of  others  for  their  object.  But  to  be  restrained 
in  things  not  affecting  their  good,  by  their  mere  displeasure, 
developes  nothing  valuable,  except  such  force  of  character 
as  may  unfold  itself  in  resisting  the  restraint.  If  acquiesced 
in,  it  dulls  and  blunts  the  whole  nature.  To  give  any  fair 
play  to  the  nature  of  each,  it  is  essential  that  different  persons 
should  be  allowed  to  lead  different  lives.  In  proportion  as 
this  latitude  has  been  exercised  in  any  age,  has  that  age  been 
noteworthy  to  posterity.  Even  despotism  does  not  produce 
its  worst  effects,  so  long  as  Individuality  exists  under  it; 
and  whatever  crushes  individuality  is  despotism,  by  whatever 
name  it  may  be  called,  and  whether  it  professes  to  be  en- 
forcing the  will  of  God  or  the  injunctions  of  men." 

Beginning  with  such  a  teacher  as  his  father  was, 
Mill  is  inclined  to  emphasize  the  extreme  worth  of 
the  teacher  and  of  proper  methods  of  teaching.  A 
very  modern  note  is  struck,  and  in  a  most  vital  and 
impressive  way.  For,  in  writing  to  Huxley  in  the 
year  of  1865,  he  says : 

"/6id.,  p.  121. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    153 

When  I  said  that  our  educational  system  needs  other  modi- 
fications still  more  than  it  needs  the  due  introduction  of 
modern  languages  and  physical  science,  what  I  had  strongly 
in  view  was  improvements  in  the  mode  of  teaching.  It  is  dis- 
graceful to  human  nature  and  society  that  the  whole  of  boy- 
hood should  be  spent  in  pretending  to  learn  certain  things 
without  learning  them.  With  proper  methods  and  good 
teachers  boys  might  really  learn  Greek  and  Latin  instead  of 
making  believe  to  learn  them,  and  might  have  ample  time 
besides  for  science,  and  for  as  much  of  modern  languages 
as  there  is  any  use  in  teaching  to  them  while  at  school.  And 
if  science  were  taught  as  badly  as  Greek  and  Latin  are  taught, 
it  would  not  do  their  minds  more  good." 

Of  course  it  is  most  evident  that  the  education 
with  which  Mill  is  largely  concerned  is  preemi- 
nently intellectual.  The  author  of  the  ''Logic" 
leads  in  the  belief  of  the  discipline  of  the  intellect. 
To  him  reasoning  rej^resents  the  process  and  the 
end  of  education.  In  various  places  and  under 
diverse  forms  he  indicates  his  fundamental  con- 
ceptions. 

In  the  ''Logic"  he  affirms  that: 

The  only  complete  safeguard  against  reasoning  ill,  is  the 
habit  of  reasoning  well;  familiarity  with  the  principles  of 
correct  reasoning,  and  practice  in  applying  those  principles. 
It  is,  however,  not  unimportant  to  consider  what  are  the 
most  common  modes  of  bad  reasoning;  by  what  appearances 

""Letters,"  Vol.  II.,  p.  43, 


154  EDUCATION 

the  mind  is  most  likely  to  be  seduced  from  the  observance 
of  true  principles  of  induction;  what,  in  short,  are  the  most 
common  and  most  dangerous  varieties  of  Apparent  Evidence, 
whereby  persons  are  misled  into  opinions  for  which  there 
does  not  exist  evidence  really  conclusive.^^ 

Logic  in  even  a  narrow  sense  as  a  part  of  educa- 
tion holds  a  high  place  in  the  thought  of  John 
Stuart  Mill: 

Logic  is,  what  it  was  so  expressively  called  by  the  school- 
men and  by  Bacon,  ars  artium;  the  science  of  science  itself. 
All  science  consists  of  data  and  conclusions  from  those  data, 
of  proofs  and  what  they  prove:  now  logic  points  out  what 
relations  must  subsist  between  data  and  whatever  can  be  con- 
cluded from  them,  between  proof  and  every  thing  which  it 
can  prove.  If  there  be  any  such  indispensable  relations,  and 
if  these  can  be  precisely  determined,  every  particular  branch 
of  science,  as  well  as  every  individual  in  the  guidance  of  his 
conduct,  is  bound  to  conform  to  those  relations,  under  the 
penalty  of  making  false  inferences — of  drawing  conclusions 
which  are  not  grounded  in  the  realities  of  things.  Whatever 
has  at  any  time  been  concluded  justly,  whatever  knowledge 
has  been  acquired  otherwise  than  by  immediate  intuition,  de- 
pended on  the  observance  of  the  laws  which  it  is  the  prov- 
ince of  logic  to  investigate.  If  the  conclusions  are  just,  and 
the  knowledge  real,  those  laws,  whether  known  or  not,  have 
been  observed. 

We  need  not,  therefore,  seek  any  further  for  a  solution  of 
the  question,  so  often  agitated,  respecting  the  utility  of  logic. 
If  a  science  of  logic  exists,  or  is  capable  of  existing,  it  must 

""A  System  of  Logic,"  p.  513. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    155 

be  useful.  If  there  bo  rules  to  which  every  mind  consciously 
or  unconsciously  conforms  in  every  instance  in  which  it  infers 
rightly,  there  seems  little  necessity  for  discussing  whether  a 
person  is  more  likely  to  observe  those  rules,  when  he  knows 
the  rules,  than  when  he  is  unacquainted  with  them." 

Logic,  therefore,  represents  a  most  important 
part  in  the  educational  program.  It  lays  down 
laws  for  the  discovery  of  truth  and  it  makes  known 
the  conditions  which  must  attend  the  search.  If 
it  is  too  broad,  ratiocination  helps  in  right  reason- 
ing from  premises,  and  induction  aids  in  drawing 
proper  conclusions  from  observation.  Logic  in 
both  these  relations  helps  us  to  exactness.  It  blows 
away,  like  the  wind,  vague  and  hazy  thinking.  It 
promotes  clearness.  It  induces  clearness  of  think- 
ing by  orderly  thinking. 

Of  a  form  of  logic  as  seen  in  Plato,  Mr.  Mill  has 
hearty  appreciation.    He  says : 

The  Socratic  method,  of  which  the  Platonic  dialogues  are 
the  chief  example,  is  unsurpassed  as  a  discipline  for  correct- 
ing the  errors,  and  clearing  up  the  confusions  incident  to  the 
intellectus  sibi  permissus,  the  understanding  which  has  made 
up  all  its  bundles  of  associations  under  the  guidance  of  pop- 
ular phraseology.  The  close,  searching  elenchus  by  which 
the  man  of  vague  generalities  is  constrained  either  to  express 
his  meaning  to  himself  in  definite  terms,  or  to  confess  that 

"Ibid.,  p.  22. 


156  EDUCATION 

he  does  not  know  what  he  is  talking  about;  the  perpetual 
testing  of  all  general  statements  by  particular  instances ;  the 
siege  in  form  which  is  laid  to  the  meaning  of  large  abstract 
terms,  by  fixing  upon  some  still  larger  class-name  which 
includes  that  and  more,  and  dividing  down  to  the  thing  sought 
— ^marking  out  its  limits  and  definition  by  a  series  of  accu- 
rately drawn  distinctions  between  it  and  each  of  the  cognate 
objects  which  are  successively  parted  off  from  it — all  this,  as 
an  education  for  precise  thinking,  is  inestimable,  and  all  this, 
even  at  that  age,  took  such  hold  of  me  that  it  became  part  of 
my  own  mind.^' 

In  this  intellectual  training,  several  subjects  be- 
sides logic  are  included  which  have  a  specific  value. 
The  St.  Andrews  address  interprets  these  subjects 
with  the  most  satisfactory  fuUness.  Of  this  ad- 
dress, Henry  Fawcett  said : 

The  mathematician  said  that  he  had  never  seen  the  advan- 
tages to  be  derived  from  the  study  of  Mathematics  so  abso- 
lutely and  so  forcibly  described.^" 

The  same  remark  was  also  made  by  a  classicist 
about  the  classics,  and,  by  a  physiologist,  about 
natural  science.  In  his  interpretation  of  the  an- 
cient classics,  as  set  forth  in  the  unique  St.  Andrews 
speech.  Mill  believes  it  is  necessary  to  know  the 
Greek  and  Latin  languages  and  literatures,  if  one 

"  Autobiography,  p.  21. 
"John  Stuart  Mill:   Twelve  Sketches  by  Herbert  Spfincer,   Henry 
Fawcett,  Frederic  Harrison  and  other  distinguished  authors,  p.  80. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    157 

is  to  think  in  Greek  or  in  Latin.  It  is  also  neces- 
sary to  know  the  language  and  its  writings,  if  one 
is  to  know  ancient  history.  Secondary  or  easy  im- 
pressions and  interpretations  are  incorrect.  In 
knowing  an  ancient  language  one  lays  in  a  stock 
of  thought  and  observation  and  becomes  familiar 
with  the  principal  literary  compositions  which  the 
hmnan  mind  has  produced.  Moreover,  one  receives 
the  most  valuable  discipline  of  the  intellect.  The 
structure  of  these  languages,  at  once  so  regular  and 
so  complex,  leads  to  this  result.  The  grammar  of 
the  Greek  language  illustrates  this  method  and 
effect.  Grammar  is  logic,  analysis,  synthesis  and 
relationship.  It  demands  discriminations,  precise 
and  accurate.    It  obliges  thinking. 

The  ancient  classics,  moreover,  are  the  accmnu- 
lated  treasures  of  wisdom.  The  experiences  of 
human  nature  and  conduct  are  in  them  gathered 
together.  These  results  in  speech  and  history,  in 
dialogue,  essay,  poetry  and  philosophy  are  the 
stores  of  the  best  ancient  civilization.  The  end  of 
education  is  here  set  forth.  The  truths  of  meta- 
physics are  here  explained.  The  methods  of  the 
search  for  truth  are  here  interpreted,  illustrated, 
and  applied. 

The  form,  too,  as  well  as  the  content  of  these 


158  EDUCATION 

examples  of  ancient  thought,  approaches  the  high- 
est perfection.  The  literature  of  Greece  is  the 
noblest.  It  has  no  rival.  The  ancients  were  neither 
hurried  nor  self-conscious  as  are  the  moderns. 
Their  style  represents  good  sense,  without  trickery 
or  deceit.  They  use  words  with  meanings,  with 
clearness  and  fitness.  They  were  not  discursive, 
but  intrinsic  and  essential.  They  chose  right  words 
for  right  thought  and  put  them  in  the  right  places. 
They  have  neither  too  much  nor  too  little.  Their 
literature  finds  a  type  in  their  sculptures.  They 
are  not  prolix.  They  are  condensed  and  brief  be- 
cause they  took  pains.  The  acquaintance  of  the 
moderns  with  these  ancient  masterpieces  would 
make  the  moderns  more  masterful. 

But  the  argument  for  the  study  of  the  sciences 
is  hardly  less  weighty.  The  sciences  give  informa- 
tion. They  tell  us  of  the  world  in  which  we  live, 
and  they  tell  us  of  ourselves.  Truth,  the  search  for 
which  is  the  most  important  employment  of  man, 
is  made  known  by  observation  and  reasoning. 
Methods  for  research  and  for  the  discovery  of 
truth  have  been  carried  to  their  highest  point  of 
usefulness  in  the  sciences.  If  ancient  literature  is 
an  illustration  of  the  art  of  expression,  the  modern 
sciences  are  the  finished  illustration  of  the  art  of 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    159 

thinking.  Mathematics  stands  for  reasoning,  phy- 
sical science  for  observation.  Models,  rules  and 
principles  for  weighing  evidence,  which  is  the  es- 
sence of  thinking,  are  most  effectively  proved  in 
the  sciences.  The  mathematical  sciences,  pure  and 
complete,  help  one  to  understand  and  to  express 
the  premises  of  reasoning  and  also  to  keep  in  mind 
the  proper  process  arising  from  these  premises. 
The  physical  sciences,  which  are  not  mathematical, 
like  chemistry,  teach  methods  of  rounding-out 
truth  by  observation  and  experiment.  Reasoning 
by  induction  and  reasoning  by  deduction  are  like- 
wise taught  by  these  studies.  In  his  examination 
of  Hamilton,  Mill  speaks  particularly  of  mathe- 
matics as  habituating  the  student  to  precision.  It 
demands  observation,  and  exactness  in  observation. 
It  teaches  the  value  of  quantities.  It  also  expresses 
the  necessity  of  progressive  reasoning.  It  requires 
sure  footing  before  and  as  each  step  is  taken. 

Neither  is  physiology  nor  psychology  to  be 
omitted.  The  knowledge  of  one's  body,  of  one's 
mind,  is  evidently  of  much  value.  To  understand 
one's  self  is  a  natural  wish.  It  also  is  a  means 
of  preventing  disaster  and  disease  of  all  sorts,  and 
of  promoting  health.  The  moral  conditions  of  life 
have  close  relations  with  the  physiological  and  the 


160  EDUCATION 

psychological  facts.  Man's  own  nature  in  both 
higher  and  lower  relations  is  most  deserving  of 
study.  Moreover,  metaphysical  controversies  are 
among  the  powerful  forces  for  giving  intellectual 
discipline.  Metaphysical  reading  and  thinking  are 
profitable  for  all  students. 

The  author  of  the  classical  political  economy  ad- 
vises, furthermore,  the  study  of  this  subject  as  a 
guidance  for  life  and  for  the  interpretation  *  of 
laws,  institutions  and  affairs  human.  The  study 
of  ethics,  of  politics,  of  history,  moreover,  aids  in 
the  humanizing  of  the  student,  equipping  him  for 
his  duty  as  a  student  and  as  a  future  citizen.  Juris- 
prudence and  international  law,  likewise,  represent 
those  principles  which  underlie  the  conduct  of  in- 
dividuals and  of  nations,  and  embody  those  methods 
by  which  individuals  and  nations  may  and  should 
live  together  and  do  prosper. 

But  education,  whatever  its  content,  fails  to  be- 
come a  proper  disciplinary  force,  unless  it  be  put 
into  practise.  Truth  is  to  lead  to  duty.  Intellect 
is  to  train  conscience,  and  conscience  to  direct  and 
incite  the  will. 

Besides  intellectual  and  moral  education,  esthet- 
ics is  not  to  suffer  neglect.  In  England,  two  causes 
have  contributed  to  the  elimination  of  the  science 


ACCORDING  TO  JOIIN  STUART  MILL    161 

of  the  beautiful  from  the  educational  process, — 
money-making  and  puritanism.  But  poetry,  paint- 
ing, sculpture  and  the  other  fine  arts,  are  never  to 
be  interpreted  as  qualities.  They  embody  the  truth 
of  that  early  saying  of  Goethe,  that  "the  beautiful 
is  greater  than  the  good,  for  it  includes  the  good/* 
The  beautiful  is  the  good  made  practical.  The 
examples  of  the  beautiful  give  quickening,  appre- 
ciation and  self-culture.  They  stir  feeling,  enlarge 
thought,  and  ennoble  life  unto  the  highest. 

Yet  these  severer  studies  do  not  alone  constitute 
the  elements  of  the  educational  process.  Of  the 
value  of  poetry  in  this  program  Mill  writes  with 
deep  sympathy.  In  particular  does  he  write  of  the 
great  ministry  of  Wordsworth  to  both  his  mind  and 
heart: 

In  the  first  place,  these  poems  addressed  themselves  power- 
fully to  one  of  the  strongest  of  my  pleasurable  susceptibili- 
ties, the  love  of  rural  objects  and  natural  scenery;  to  which 
I  had  been  indebted  not  only  for  much  of  the  pleasure  of  my 
life,  but  quite  recently  for  relief  from  one  of  my  longest  re- 
lapses into  depression.  In  this  power  of  rural  beauty  over 
me,  there  was  a  foundation  laid  for  taking  pleasure  in  Words- 
worth 's  poetry ;  the  more  so,  as  his  scenery  lies  mostly  among 
mountains,  which,  owing  to  my  early  Pyrenean  excursion, 
were  my  ideal  of  natural  beauty.  But  Wordsworth  would 
never  have  had  any  great  effect  on  me,  if  he  had  merely 


162  EDUCATION 

placed  before  me  beautiful  pictures  of  natural  scenery.  Scoti 
does  this  still  better  than  Wordsworth,  and  a  very  second- 
rate  landscape  does  it  more  effectually  than  any  poet.  What 
made  Wordsworth's  poems  a  medicine  for  my  state  of  mind, 
was  that  they  expressed,  not  mere  outward  beauty,  but  states 
of  feeling,  and  of  thought  coloured  by  feeling,  under  the  ex- 
citement of  beauty.  They  seemed  to  be  the  very  culture  of 
the  feelings,  which  I  was  in  quest  of.  In  them  I  seemed  to 
draw  from  a  source  of  inward  joy,  of  sympathetic  and  imagi- 
native pleasure,  which  could  be  shared  in  by  all  human  be- 
ings; which  had  no  connexion  with  struggle  or  imperfection, 
but  would  be  made  richer  by  every  improvement  in  the 
physical  or  social  condition  of  mankind.  From  them  I  seemed 
to  learn  what  would  be  the  perennial  sources  of  happiness, 
when  all  the  greater  evils  of  life  shall  have  been  removed. 
And  I  felt  myself  at  once  better  and  happier  as  I  came  under 
their  influence.^^ 

But  the  education  of  the  intellect  and  of  the 
imagination  does  not  complete  the  whole  of  educa- 
tion, for  man  is  more  than  intellectual.  Man  has 
feelings  and  a  heart.  He  is  a  social  being,  and,  as 
a  social  being,  faculties  other  than  intellectual  have 
their  place.  Man  is  also  a  doer  and  an  executive. 
He  is  a  moral  being  and  a  religious  soul.  He  has 
a  will.  He,  also,  is  endowed  with  the  capacity  for 
seeing  the  beautiful  and  sublime.  He  is  an  esthetic 
being.    Education  is  comprehensive  of  the  whole 

**  Autobiography,  p.  147. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    163 

nature  of  the  individual  and  of  all  the  relations 
which  the  individual  embodies. 

The  intellect,  moreover,  is  not  cultured  by  itself 
alone,  either  as  a  condition  or  as  a  force.  It  re- 
ceives enrichment  from  the  feelings.  As  Mill  says 
in  the  Autobiography: 

I  had  now  learnt  by  experience  that  the  passive  susceptibili- 
ties needed  to  be  cultivated  as  well  as  the  active  capacities, 
and  required  to  be  nourished  and  enriched  as  well  as  guided. 
I  did  not,  for  an  instant,  lose  sight  of,  or  undervalue,  that 
part  of  the  truth  which  I  had  seen  before;  I  never  turned 
recreant  to  intellectual  culture,  or  ceased  to  consider  the 
power  and  practice  of  analysis  as  an  essential  condition  both 
of  individual  and  of  social  improvement.  But  I  thought  that 
it  had  consequences  which  required  to  be  corrected,  by  join- 
ing other  kinds  of  cultivation  with  it.  The  maintenance 
of  a  due  balance  among  the  faculties,  now  seemed  to  me  of 
primary  importance.  The  cultivation  of  the  feelings  be- 
came one  of  the  cardinal  points  in  my  ethical  and  philosophi- 
cal creed.  And  my  thoughts  and  inclinations  turned  in  an 
increasing  degree  towards  whatever  seemed  capable  of  being 
instrumental  to  that  object. 

I  now  began  to  find  meaning  in  the  things  which  I  had 
read  or  heard  about  the  importance  of  poetry  and  art  as 
instruments  of  human  culture.  But  it  was  some  time  longer 
before  I  began  to  know  this  by  personal  experience.  The 
only  one  of  the  imaginative  arts  in  which  I  had  from  child- 
hood taken  great  pleasure,  was  music;  the  best  effect  of 
which  (and  in  this  it  surpasses  perhaps  every  other  art) 
consists  in  exciting  enthusiasm;  in  winding  up  to  a  high 


164  EDUCATION 

pitch  those  feelings  of  an  elevated  kind  which  are  already 
in  the  character,  but  to  which  this  excitement  gives  a  glow  and 
a  fervour,  which,  though  transitory  at  its  utmost  height,  is 
precious  for  sustaining  them  at  other  times.^^ 

It  is  furthermore  to  be  remembered  that  the 
intellect  and  every  part  of  one's  being  are  cul- 
tivated by  human  association.  In  education  the 
social  relations  of  man  have  not  received  sufficient 
emphasis.  The  value  of  great  men,  men  of  great 
manners  and  noble  qualities,  in  this  general  cul- 
tivation, is  of  the  highest  consequence. 

Great  men,  and  great  actions,  are  seldom  wasted;  they 
send  forth  a  thousand  unseen  influences,  more  effective  than 
those  which  are  seen;  and  though  nine  out  of  every  ten 
things  done,  with  a  good  purpose,  by  those  who  are  in  ad- 
vance of  their  age,  produce  no  material  effect,  the  tenth 
thing  produces  effects  twenty  times  as  great  as  any  one 
would  have  dreamed  of  predicting  from  it.  Even  the  men 
who  for  want  of  sufficiently  favorable  circumstances  left  no 
impress  at  all  upon  their  own  age,  have  often  been  of  the 
greatest  value  to  posterity.  Who  could  appear  to  have  lived 
more  entirely  in  vain  than  some  of  the  early  heretics?  They 
were  burned  or  massacred,  their  writings  extirpated,  their 
memory  anathematized,  and  their  very  names  and  existence 
left  for  seven  or  eight  centuries  in  the  obscurity  of  musty 
manuscripts — their  history  to  be  gathered,  perhaps,  only  from 
the  sentences  by  which  they  were  condemned.  Yet  the  mem- 
ory of  these  men — men  who  resisted  certain  pretensions  or 
**Ibid.,  p.  143. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL     165 

certain  dogmas  of  the  Church  in  the  very  age  in  which  the 
unanimous  assent  of  Christendom  was  afterward  claimed  as 
having  been  given  to  them,  and  asserted  as  the  ground  of 
their  authority — broke  the  chain  of  tradition,  established  a 
series  of  precedents  for  resistance,  inspired  later  Reformers 
with  the  courage,  and  armed  them  with  the  weapons,  which 
they  needed  when  mankind  were  better  prepared  to  follow 
their  impulse.'* 

In  this  relationship,  too,  of  social  education,  Mr. 
Mill  believes  in  the  value  of  the  fellowship  of 
equals.  This  value  is  reinforced  by  his  own  ex- 
perience.   He  says : 

It  was  in  the  winter  of  1822-3  that  I  formed  the  plan  of  a 
little  society,  to  be  composed  of  young  men  agreeing  in  funda- 
mental principles — acknowledging  Utility  as  their  standard 
in  ethics  and  politics,  and  a  certain  number  of  the  principal 
corollaries  drawn  from  it  in  the  philosophy  I  had  accepted — 
and  meeting  once  a  fortnight  to  read  essays  and  discuss  ques- 
tions conformably  to  the  premises  thus  agreed  on.** 

But  association  with  one's  superiors  or  with 
one's  equals  is  not  the  only  method  of  gaining 
cultivation.  Cultivation  is  also  to  be  gained  from 
executive  work.  The  will  and  its  expression  react 
upon  the  intellectual  faculties.  If  efficiency  springs 
from  these  faculties,  it  tends  in  turn  those  same 
faculties  to  develop  and  to  expand. 

*"A  System  of  Logic,"  p.  650. 
"Autobiography,  p.  79. 


166  EDUCATION 

In  the  Autobiography  it  is  said: 

I  am  disposed  to  agree  with  what  has  been  surmised  by 
others,  that  the  opportunity  which  my  official  position  gave 
me  of  learning  by  personal  observation  the  necessary  condi- 
tions of  the  practical  conduct  of  public  affairs,  has  been  of 
considerable  value  to  me  as  a  theoretical  reformer  of  the 
opinions  and  institutions  of  my  time.  Not,  indeed,  that 
public  business  transacted  on  paper,  to  take  effect  on  the 
other  side  of  the  globe,  was  of  itself  calculated  to  give  much 
practical  knowledge  of  life.  But  the  occupation  accustomed 
me  to  see  and  hear  the  difficulties  of  every  course,  and  the 
means  of  obviating  them,  stated  and  discussed  deliberately 
with  a  view  to  execution;  it  gave  me  opportunities  of  per- 
ceiving when  public  measures,  and  other  political  facts,  did 
not  produce  the  effects  which  had  been  expected  of  them, 
and  from  what  causes;  above  all,  it  was  valuable  to  me  by 
making  me,  in  this  portion  of  my  activity,  merely  one  wheel 
in  a  machine,  the  whole  of  which  had  to  work  together.  As 
a  speculative  writer,  I  should  have  had  no  one  to  consult 
but  myself,  and  should  have  encountered  in  my  speculations 
none  of  the  obstacles  which  would  have  started  up  whenever 
they  came  to  be  applied  to  practice.  But  as  a  Secretary  con- 
ducting political  correspondence,  I  could  not  issue  an  order 
or  express  an  opinion,  without  satisfying  various  persons  very 
unlike  myself,  that  the  thing  was  fit  to  be  done.  I  was  thus 
in  a  good  position  for  finding  out  by  practice  the  mode  of 
putting  a  thought  which  gives  it  easiest  admittance  into  minds 
not  prepared  for  it  by  habit;  while  I  becam,e  practically 
conversant  with  the  difficulties  of  moving  bodies  of  men,  the 
necessities  of  compromise,  the  art  of  sacrificing  the 
non-essential  to  preserve  the  essential.    I  learnt  how  to  ob- 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL     167 

tain  the  best  I  could,  when  I  could  not  obtain  everything; 
instead  of  being  indignant  or  dispirited  because  I  could  not 
have  entirely  my  own  way,  to  be  pleased  and  encouraged  when 
I  could  have  the  smallest  part  of  it;  and  when  even  that 
could  not  be,  to  bear  with  complete  equanimity  the  being 
overruled  altogether.  I  have  found,  through  life,  these  acqui- 
sitions to  be  of  the  greatest  possible  importance  for  per- 
sonal happiness,  and  they  are  also  a  very  necessary  condi- 
tion for  enabling  any  one,  either  as  theorist  or  as  practical 
man,  to  effect  the  greatest  amount  of  good  compatible  with 
his  opportunities.*' 

In  one  of  the  great  essays  it  is  also  said : 

It  is  by  action  that  the  faculties  are  called  forth,  more  than 
by  words;  more,  at  least,  than  by  words  unaccompanied  by 
action.  We  want  schools  in  which  the  children  of  the  poor 
should  learn  to  use,  not  only  their  hands,  but  their  minds 
for  the  guidance  of  their  hands;  in  which  they  should  be 
trained  to  the  actual  adaptation  of  means  to  ends;  should 
become  familiar  with  the  accomplishment  of  the  same  ob- 
ject by  various  processes,  and  be  made  to  apprehend  with 
their  intellects  in  what  consists  the  difference  between  the 
right  way  of  performing  industrial  operations  and  the  wrong. 
Meanwhile,  they  would  acquire,  not  only  manual  dexterity, 
but  habits  of  order  and  regularity,  of  the  utmost  use  in  after- 
life, and  which  have  more  to  do  with  the  formation  of  char- 
acter than  many  persons  are  aware  of.  Such  things  would 
do  much  more  than  is  usually  believed  towards  converting 
these  neglected  creatures  into  rational  beings, — beings  ca- 
pable  of   foresight,   accessible  to   reasons  and  motives  ad- 

» Ibid.,  pp.  84-86. 


168  EDUCATION 

dressed  to  their  understanding,  and  therefore  not  governed 
by  the  utterly  senseless  modes  of  feeling  and  action  which  so 
much  astonish  educated  and  observing  persons  when  brought 
into  contact  with  them. 

But  when  education,  in  this  its  narrow  sense,  has  done  its 
best,  and  even  to  enable  it  to  do  its  best,  an  education  of 
another  sort  is  required,  such  as  schools  cannot  give.  What 
is  taught  to  a  child  at  school  will  be  of  little  effect,  if  the  cir- 
cumstances which  surround  the  grown  man  or  woman  con- 
tradict the  lesson.  We  may  cultivate  his  understanding;  but 
what  if  he  cannot  employ  it  without  becoming  discontented 
with  his  position,  and  disaffected  to  the  whole  order  of  things 
in  which  he  is  cast?  Society  educates  the  poor,  for  good  or 
for  ill,  by  its  conduct  to  them,  even  more  than  by  direct 
teaching.  A  sense  of  this  truth  is  the  most  valuable  feature 
in  the  new  philanthropic  agitation ;  and  the  recognition  of  it 
is  important,  whatever  mistakes  may  be  at  first  made  in 
practically  applying  it.^' 

Regarding  the  necessity,  moreover,  of  moral 
education,  and,  indeed,  of  religious.  Mill  is  not 
silent.   He  says,  at  length : 

My  father's  moral  convictions,  wholly  dissevered  from  re- 
ligion, were  very  much  of  the  character  of  those  of  the  Greek 
philosophers;  and  were  delivered  with  the  force  and  decision 
which  characterized  all  that  came  from  him.  Even  at  the 
very  early  age  at  which  I  read  with  him  the  Memorabilia  of 
Xenophon,  I  imbibed  from  that  work  and  from  his  comments 
a  deep  respect  for  the  character  of  Socrates;  who  stood  in 
my  mind  as  a  model  of  ideal  excellence:   and  I  well  remem- 

■*  *  *  DissertationB  and  Discussions,"  Vol.  II.,  p.  282. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    169 

ber  how  my  father  at  that  time  impressed  upon  me  the 
lesson  of  the  "Choice  of  Hercules."  At  a  somewhat  later 
period  the  lofty  moral  standard  exhibited  in  the  writings  of 
Plato  operated  upon  me  with  great  force.  My  father's  moral 
inculcations  were  at  all  times  mainly  those  of  the  "Socratici 
viri;"  justice,  temperance  (to  which  he  gave  a  very  extended 
application),  veracity,  perseverance,  readiness  to  encounter 
pain  and  especially  labour ;  regard  for  the  public  good ;  esti- 
mation of  persons  according  to  their  merits,  and  of  things 
according  to  their  intrinsic  usefulness;  a  life  of  exertion  in 
contradiction  to  one  of  self-indulgent  ease  and  sloth.  These 
and  other  moralities  he  conveyed  in  brief  sentences,  uttered 
as  occasion  arose,  of  grave  exhortation,  or  stem  reprobation 
and  contempt. 

But  though  direct  moral  teaching  does  much,  indirect  does 
more;  and  the  effect  my  father  produced  on  my  character, 
did  not  depend  solely  on  what  he  said  or  did  with  that  direct 
object,  but  also,  and  still  more,  on  what  manner  of  man 
he  was." 

In  a  letter,  too,  written  in  1849,  to  W.  J.  Fox, 
he  says : 

I  would  omit  the  words  including  moral  instruction.  What 
the  sort  of  people  who  will  have  the  management  of  any 
such  schools  mean  by  moral  instruction,  is  much  the  same 
thing  as  what  they  mean  by  religious  instruction,  only  low- 
ered to  the  world's  practice.  It  means  cramming  the  chil- 
dren directly  with  all  the  common  professions  about  what  is 
right  and  wrong,  and  about  the  worth  of  different  objects 
in  life,  and  filling  them  indirectly  with  the  spirit  of  all  the 

"Autobiography,  pp.  46-47. 


170  EDUCATION 

notions  on  such  matters  which  vulgar-minded  people  are  in 
the  habit  of  acting  on  without  consciously  professing.  I 
know  it  is  impossible  to  prevent  much  of  this  from  being 
done — ^but  the  less  of  it  there  is  the  better,  and  I  would  not 
set  people  upon  doing  more  of  it  than  they  might  otherwise 
do,  by  insisting  expressly  on  moral  instruction. 

If  it  were  possible  to  provide  for  giving  real  moral  instruc- 
tion it  would  be  worth  more  than  all  else  that  schools  can 
do.  But  no  programme  of  moral  instruction,  which  would 
be  really  good,  would  have  a  chance  of  being  assented  to 
or  followed  by  the  manager  of  a  general  scheme  of  public 
instruction  in  the  present  state  of  people's  minds.^^ 

Mr.  Mill  holds  definite  ideas  in  respect  to  the 
value  of  religion,  whether  that  religion  be  Christian 
or  Buddhistic.  In  his  essay  on  the  Utility  of  Reli- 
gion, he  contrasts  the  power  of  education  with  the 
power  of  religion.  The  contrast  relates  to  one  peo- 
ple, and  to  one  people  only.  With  a  generality 
of  statement,  which  he  seldom  allows  himself,  he 
says: 

The  power  of  education  is  almost  boundless:  there  is  not 
one  natural  inclination  which  it  is  not  strong  enough  to 
coerce,  and,  if  needful,  to  destroy  by  disuse.  In  the  greatest 
recorded  victory  which  education  has  ever  achieved  over 
a  whole  host  of  natural  inclinations  in  an  entire  people — 
the  maintenance  through  centuries  of  the  institutions  of 
Lycurgus, — it  was  very  little,  if  even  at  all,  indebted  to 
religion:    for  the  Gods  of  the  Spartans  were  the  same  as 

""Letters,"  Vol.  I.,  p.  150. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    171 

those  of  other  Greek  states;  and  though,  no  doubt,  every 
state  of  Greece  believed  that  its  particular  polity  had  at 
its  first  establishment,  some  sort  of  divine  sanction  (mostly 
that  of  the  Delphian  oracle),  there  was  seldom  any  difficulty 
in  obtaining  the  same  or  an  equally  powerful  sanction  for  a 
change.  .  .  .  The  case  of  Greece  is,  I  believe,  the  only  one 
in  which  any  teaching,  other  than  religious,  has  had  the 
unspeakable  advantage  of  forming  the  basis  of  education :  and 
though  much  may  be  said  against  the  quality  of  some  part 
of  the  teaching,  very  little  can  be  said  against  its  effective- 
ness. The  most  memorable  example  of  the  power  of  educa- 
tion over  conduct,  is  afforded  (as  I  have  just  remarked)  by 
this  exceptional  case ;  constituting  a  strong  presumption  that 
in  other  cases,  early  religious  teaching  has  owed  its  power 
over  mankind  rather  to  its  being  early  than  to  its  being 
religious.*" 

In  estimating  the  worth  of  education  of  all  types 
and  content,  happiness  is  to  be  selected  as  a  stand- 
ard. The  principle  is  the  old  utilitarian  one, 
largely  interpreted,  that  that  education  is  of  the 
most  worth  which  gives  the  greatest  happiness  to 
the  greatest  number  of  persons. 

In  the  "Logic"  it  is  said: 

I  do  not  mean  to  assert  that  the  promotion  of  happiness 
should  be  itself  the  end  of  all  actions,  or  even  all  rules  of 
action.  It  is  the  justification,  and  ought  to  be  the  controller, 
of  all  ends,  but  it  is  not  itself  the  sole  end.  There  are  many 
virtuous  actions,  and  even  virtuous  modes  of  action  (though 

""Three  Essays  on  Eeligion,"  pp.  82-83. 


172  EDUCATION 

the  cases  are,  I  think,  less  frequent  than  is  often  supposed), 
by  which  happiness  in  the  particular  instance  is  sacrificed, 
more  pain  being  produced  than  pleasure.  But  the  conduct  of 
which  this  can  be  truly  asserted,  admits  of  justification  only 
because  it  can  be  shown  that,  on  the  whole,  more  happiness 
will  exist  in  the  world,  if  feelings  are  cultivated  which  will 
make  people,  in  certain  cases,  regardless  of  happiness.  I 
fully  admit  that  this  is  true ;  that  the  cultivation  of  an  ideal 
nobleness  of  will  and  conduct  should  be  to  individual  human 
beings  an  end,  to  which  the  specific  pursuit  either  of  their 
own  happiness  or  of  that  of  others  (except  so  far  as  included 
in  that  idea)  should,  in  any  case  of  conflict,  give  way.  But  I 
hold  that  the  very  question,  what  constitutes  this  elevation 
of  character,  is  itself  to  be  decided  by  a  reference  to  hap- 
piness as  the  standard.  The  character  itself  should  be,  to 
the  individual,  a  paramount  end,  simply  because  the  exist- 
ence of  this  ideal  nobleness  of  character,  or  of  a  near  ap- 
proach to  it,  in  any  abundance,  would  go  farther  than  all 
things  else  toward  making  human  life  happy,  both  in 
the  comparatively  humble  sense  of  pleasure  and  freedom  from 
pain,  and  in  the  higher  meaning,  of  rendering  life,  not  what 
it  now  is  almost  universally,  puerile  and  insignificant,  but 
such  as  human  beings  with  highly  developed  faculties  can 
care  to  have.^" 

It  is  furthermore  to  be  remembered  that  educa- 
tion is  designed  to  breed  and  to  train  great  men. 
If  the  large  plateau  of  general  culture  needs  lifting, 
the  need  is  great  of  the  raising  of  the  Himalaya 
peaks  of  thought  and  of  power. 

••"A  System  of  Logic,"  p.  658. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    173 
In  the  essay  on  "Liberty**  it  is  interpreted: 

In  sober  truth,  whatever  homage  may  be  professed,  or  even 
paid,  to  real  or  supposed  mental  superiority,  the  general  tend- 
ency of  things  throughout  the  world  is  to  render  mediocrity 
the  ascendant  power  among  mankind.  In  ancient  history,  in 
the  Middle  Ages,  and  in  a  diminishing  degree  through  the 
long  transition  from  feudality  to  the  present  time,  the  indi- 
vidual was  a  power  in  himself;  and  if  he  had  either  great 
talents  or  a  high  social  position,  he  was  a  considerable  power. 
At  present  individuals  are  lost  in  the  crowd.  In  politics 
it  is  almost  a  triviality  to  say  that  public  opinion  now  rules 
the  world.  The  only  power  deserving  the  name  is  that  of 
masses,  and  of  governments  while  they  make  themselves  the 
organ  of  the  tendencies  and  instincts  of  masses.  This  is  as 
true  in  the  moral  and  social  relations  of  private  life  as  in 
public  transactions.  Those  whose  opinions  go  by  the 
name  of  public  opinion,  are  not  always  the  same  sort  of 
public:  in  America,  they  are  the  whole  white  population;  in 
England,  chiefly  the  middle  class.  But  they  are  always  a 
mass,  that  is  to  say,  collective  mediocrity.  And  what  is  a 
still  greater  novelty,  the  mass  do  not  now  take  their  opinions 
from  dignitaries  in  Church  or  State,  from  ostensible  lead- 
ers, or  from  books.  Their  thinking  is  done  for  them  by  men 
much  like  themselves,  addressing  them  or  speaking  in  their 
name,  on  the  spur  of  the  moment,  through  the  newspapers. 
I  am  not  complaining  of  all  this.  I  do  not  assert  that  any- 
thing better  is  compatible,  as  a  general  rule,  with  the  pres- 
ent low  state  of  the  human  mind.  But  that  does  not  hinder 
the  government  of  mediocrity  from  being  mediocre  govern- 
ment. No  government  by  a  democracy  or  a  numerous  aris- 
tocracy, either  in  its  political  acts  or  in  the  opinions,  quali- 


174  EDUCATION 

ties,  and  tone  of  mind  which  it  fosters,  ever  did  or  could  rise 
above  mediocrity,  except  in  so  far  as  the  sovereign  Many- 
have  let  themselves  be  guided  (which  in  their  best  times  they 
always  have  done)  by  the  counsels  and  influence  of  a  more 
highly  gifted  and  instructed  One  or  Few.  The  initiation  of 
all  wise  or  noble  things,  comes  and  must  come  from  indi- 
viduals; generally  at  first  from  some  one  individual.  The 
honor  and  glory  of  the  average  man  is  that  he  is  capable  of 
following  that  initiative;  that  he  can  respond  internally  to 
wise  and  noble  things,  and  be  led  to  them  with  his  eyes  open, 
I  am  not  countenancing  the  sort  of  "hero-worship"  which 
applauds  the  strong  man  of  genius  for  forcibly  seizing  on 
the  government  of  the  world  and  making  it  do  his  bidding  in 
spite  of  itself.  All  he  can  claim  is,  freedom  to  point  out  the 
way.  The  power  of  compelling  others  into  it,  is  not  only 
inconsistent  with  the  freedom  and  development  of  all  the 
rest,  but  corrupting  to  the  strong  man  himself.  It  does  seem, 
however,  that  when  the  opinions  of  masses  of  merely  average 
men  are  everywhere  become  or  becoming  the  dominant  power, 
the  counterpoise  and  corrective  to  that  tendency  would  be, 
the  more  and  more  pronounced  individuality  of  those  who 
stand  on  the  higher  eminences  of  thought.  It  is  in  these 
circumstances  most  especially,  that  exceptional  individuals, 
instead  of  being  deterred,  should  be  encouraged  in  acting  dif- 
ferently from  the  masses.  In  other  times  there  was  no  ad- 
vantage in  their  doing  so,  unless  they  acted  not  only  differ- 
ently, but  better.  In  this  age  the  mere  example  of  non-con- 
formity, the  mere  refusal  to  bend  the  knee  to  custom,  is  itself 
a  service.  Precisely  because  the  tyranny  of  opinion  is  such 
as  to  make  eccentricity  a  reproach,  it  is  desirable,  in  order 
to  break  through  that  tyranny,  that  people  should  be  eccen- 
tric.    Eccentricity  has  always  abounded  when  and  where 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    175 

strength  of  character  has  abounded;  and  the  amount  of  ec- 
centricity in  a  society  has  generally  been  proportional  to  the 
amount  of  genius,  mental  vigor,  and  moral  courage  which  it 
contained.  That  so  few  now  dare  to  be  eccentric,  marks  the 
chief  danger  of  the  time.'^ 

In  one  of  the  early  essays,  less  great  than  the 
** Liberty,"  the  same  ground  is  taken: 

If  we  were  asked  for  what  end,  above  all  others,  endowed 
universities  exist,  or  ought  to  exist,  we  should  answer,  "To 
keep  alive  philosophy."  This,  too,  is  the  ground  on  which, 
of  late  years,  our  own  national  endowments  have  chiefly  been 
defended.  To  educate  common  minds  for  the  common  busi- 
ness of  life,  a  public  provision  may  be  useful,  but  is  not 
indispensable;  nor  are  there  wanting  arguments,  not  con- 
clusive, yet  of  considerable  strength  to  show  that  it  is  un- 
desirable. Whatever  individual  competition  does  at  all,  it 
commonly  does  best.  All  things  in  which  the  public  are  ade- 
quate judges  of  excellence  are  best  supplied  where  the 
stimulus  of  individual  interest  is  the  most  active;  and  that 
is  where  pay  is  in  proportion  to  exertion:  not  where  pay 
is  made  sure  in  the  first  instance,  and  the  only  security  for 
exertion  is  the  superintendence  of  government ;  far  less  where, 
as  in  the  English  universities,  even  that  security  has  been 
successfully  excluded.  But  there  is  an  education  of  which 
it  cannot  be  pretended  that  the  public  are  competent  judges, 
— ^the  education  by  which  great  minds  are  formed.  To  rear 
up  minds  with  aspirations  and  faculties  above  the  herd,  ca- 
pable of  leading  on  their  countrymen  to  greater  achieve- 
ments in  virtue,  intelligence,  and  social  well-being, — to  do 

»"0n  Liberty,"  p.  127. 


176  EDUCATION 

this,  and  likewise  so  to  educate  the  leisured  classes  of  the 
community  generally,  that  they  may  participate  as  far  as 
possible  in  the  qualities  of  these  superior  spirits,  and  be 
prepared  to  appreciate  them  and  follow  in  their  steps, — 
these  are  purposes  requiring  institutions  of  education  placed 
above  dependence  on  the  immediate  pleasure  of  that  very 
multitude  whom  they  are  designed  to  elevate.  These  are  the 
ends  for  which  endowed  universities  are  desirable;  they  are 
those  which  all  endowed  universities  profess  to  aim  at:  and 
great  is  their  disgrace,  if,  having  undertaken  this  task,  and 
claiming  credit  for  fulfilling  it,  they  leave  it  unfulfilled.^^ 

In  one  of  his  later  letters  in  a  more  informal 
way  Mr.  Mill  indicates  and  applies  the  same  belief : 

Experience  shows  that  academies,  whether  of  literature  or 
science,  generally  prefer  inoffensive  mediocrities  to  men  of 
original  genius.  Cuvier  was  no  ordinary  man,  but  neither 
Geoffrey  St.  Hilaire  nor  Darwin  would  have  had  a  chance 
of  obtaining  his  vote  for  a  professorship.^^ 

This  need  of  the  training  of  great  men  is  of  all 
parts  of  the  world  most  urgent  in  the  United 
States. 

Writing  to  James  M.  Barnard,  of  Boston,  in 
the  year  of  1869,  Mill  says : 

The  great  desideratum  in  America — and  though  not  quite 
in  an  equal  degree,  I  may  say  in  England  too — is  the  im- 
provement of  the  higher  education.     America  surpasses  all 


""Dissertations  and  Discussions,"  Vol.  I.,  p.  121. 
«" Letters,"  Vol.  II.,  p.  354. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  STUART  MILL    177 

countries  in  the  amount  of  mental  cultivation  which  she  has 
been  able  to  make  universal ;  but  a  high  average  level  is  not 
everything.  There  are  wanted,  I  do  not  say  a  class,  but 
a  great  number  of  persons  of  the  highest  degree  of  cultivation 
which  the  accumulated  acquisitions  of  the  human  race  make 
it  possible  to  give  them.  From  such  persons,  in  a  community 
that  knows  no  distinction  of  ranks,  civilisation  would  rain 
down  its  influences  on  the  remainder  of  society,  and  the 
higher  faculties,  having  been  highly  cultivated  in  the  more 
advanced  part  of  the  public,  would  give  forth  products  and 
create  an  atmosphere  that  would  produce  a  high  average 
of  the  same  faculties  in  a  people  so  well  prepared  in  point 
of  general  intelligence  as  the  people  of  the  United  States." 

Such  is  my  interpretation  of  Mill's  idea  of  educa- 
tion. It  is  an  education  deep,  broad  and  high, — as 
broad  as  human  nature,  as  high  as  truth,  as  deep 
as  destiny.  Though  severe  is  the  type,  it  is  still 
human.  Though  Mill  might  have  accepted  mem- 
bership in  a  narrow  sect  of  educational  Pharisa- 
ism, his  thought  of  discipline  is  broad.  Though  he 
emphasized  the  older  type  of  education  as  seen  in 
the  ancient  classics,  he  developed  the  inductive  logic 
and  illustrated  its  monumental  types  with  multi- 
tudes of  examples  drawn  from  modern  science. 
Though  not  an  educationist  or  formal  instinictor, 
his  influence  as  an  educator  was  for  a  score  of  years 
commanding.    Though  he  was  personally  unknown 

»*" Letters,"  Vol.  II.,  p.  227. 


178  EDUCATION 

to  many  of  the  leaders  of  Ms  time,  though  he  was 
not  a  child  of  Oxford  or  of  Cambridge,  he  was 
the  chief  force  in  influencing  for  a  generation  their 
undergraduates.  His  appreciation  of  all  branches 
of  knowledge  was  deep,  and  his  sympathy  with  men 
of  all  sorts  and  conditions  was  broad  without  being 
superficial,  and  high  without  visionariness. 


EDUCATION   ACCORDING  TO  GLADSTONE 

A  MAN'S  conception  of  the  value  and  the  na- 
ture of  education  is  determined  largely  by 
two  considerations:  The  first  is  his  conception  of 
the  purpose  of  life.  Mr.  Gladstone  thought  of  life 
as  a  solemn  and  serious  duty,  to  be  entered  upon 
like  the  marriage  service,  reverently,  soberly,  dis- 
creetly, advisedly,  and  to  be  pursued  with  such  ear- 
nestness and  wisdom  that  the  conclusion  would  be 
as  triumphant  as  inevitable.  It  was  a  great  and 
noble  calling  he  felt  life  to  be;  not  a  mean  and 
grovelling  thing  that  one  must  shuffle  through,  but 
an  elevated  and  lofty  destiny. 

The  second  consideration  which  helps  in  deter- 
mining a  man's  sense  of  the  value  and  nature  of 
education  relates  to  his  personal  experience:  his 
own  education  helps  to  make  up  his  judgment  re- 
garding what  all  education  ought  to  be.  This  judg- 
ment is  applied  quite  as  often  negatively  as  posi- 
tively. Frequently  a  man  feels  that  the  method  of 
his  own  education  has  proved  a  failure  so  lament- 

179 


180  EDUCATION 

able  that  he  counsels  every  one  to  follow  any  other 
method  than  that  which  he  himself  has  suffered. 
More  frequently  a  man  believes  that  his  own  kind 
of  education  is  the  best  for  others.  Mr.  Gladstone 's 
estimate  of  the  worth  of  the  different  types  of  edu- 
cation is,  in  no  small  degree,  an  exponent  of  the 
type  of  education  which  he  himself  received. 

In  the  year  1831,  Mr.  Gladstone  took  his  double 
first-class  at  Oxford  as  had,  twenty-three  years  be- 
fore, Sir  Robert  Peel.  The  double  first-class  was, 
of  course,  in  classics  and  mathematics.  Perhaps 
no  subject  in  the  whole  educational  curriculum 
has  been  more  questioned  than  mathematics  as  a 
means  of  intellectual  discipline.  Of  the  value  of 
mathematics  in  education  he  had  a  high  opinion, 
for  all  minds  excepting  those  which  might  claim  to 
have  the  gift  of  genius.  In  his  little  memoir  of 
Arthur  Henry  Hallam,  Mr.  Gladstone  does  speak  of 
the  disadvantage  of  his  friend's  having  gone  to  the 
mathematical  University  of  Cambridge.  Another 
of  Hallam 's  *^most  valued  friends,"  writing  of 
Hallam 's  mathematical  abilities,  says  *'he  declined 
the  drudgery  of  the  apprenticeship. ' '  ^ 

But  the  ordinary  mind,  Mr.  Gladstone  realized, 

*  Eemains  in  Verse  and  Prose  of  Arthur  Henry  Hallam,  John  Murray, 
Preface,  p.  xxx. 


ACCORDING  TO  GLADSTONE   181 

could  not  afford  to  dispense  with  the  training  of 
mathematics.  He  felt  that  for  those  who  found 
special  difficulty  in  mathematical  reasoning,  it 
should  be  particularly  valuable.  He  believed  that 
few  people  have  what  is  called  a  turn  for  anything. 
The  development  of  our  capacities  is  made  out  of 
elements  which  before  their  development  could 
hardly  be  seen. 

One  advantage  of  the  training  in  mathematics 
lies  in  accuracy.  Mr.  Gladstone  writes  to  his  eldest 
son,  W.  H.  Gladstone,  in  1857,  saying: 

When  I  was  at  Eton  we  knew  very  little  indeed,  but  we 
knew  it  accurately.  The  extension  of  knowledge  is  an  excel- 
lent thing,  but  the  first  condition  of  all  is  to  have  it  exact. 
I  am  under  the  impression,  from  our  Italian  reading,  that 
you  are  trying  to  keep  this  always  in  mind,  and  I  feel  most 
desirous  you  should,  for  it  is  hard  to  say  what  an  evil 
the  want  of  it  always  proves.^ 

The  value  which  Mr.  Gladstone  finds  in  mathe- 
matics represents  that  which  he  thought  belonged 
to  metaphysics.  A  logical  conclusion  this,  for 
mathematics  is  essentially  a  form  of  philosophy. 
He  was  not  primarily  a  metaphysician  or  a  mathe- 
matician.   As  Mr.  Morley  says : 

* ' '  Correspondence  on  Church  and  Religion  of  William  Ewart  Glad- 
stone, "  by  D.  C.  Lathburj,  Macmillan  Co.,  1910,  VoL  II.,  p.  160. 


182  EDUCATION 

As  to  the  problems  of  the  metaphysician,  Mr.  Gladstone 
showed  little  curiosity.  Nor  for  abstract  discussion  in  its 
highest  shape — for  investigation  of  ultimate  propositions — 
had  he  any  of  that  power  of  subtle  and  ingenious  reasoning 
which  was  often  so  extraordinary  when  he  came  to  deal  with 
the  concrete,  the  historic  and  the  demonstrable.^ 

But  he  early  showed  a  great  regard  for  Bishop 
Butler.    To  his  son  at  Oxford,  he  writes : 

With  respect  to  philosophy,  I  do  not  know  what  may  be 
best  according  to  modern  fashions  at  Oxford,  nor  do  I  know 
what  number  of  books  you  should  take  up.  But,  as  far  as 
the  value  of  the  books  in  themjselves  and  for  discipline  of 
the  mind  are  concerned,  I  should  recommend  you  as  three 
books  Aristotle's  "Ethics"  and  "Politics"  and  Butler's  ** An- 
alogy." You  should  also  read  and  know  Butler's  Sermons. 
I  should  think  you  ought  now  to  begin  the  "Analogy,"  or  the 
"Politics,"  if  not  both.  I  would  read  little  at  a  time,  making 
sure  that  you  thoroughly  understand  and  possess  everything 
as  you  go  along — not  that  the  two  are  the  same,  for  the 
"Politics"  will  call  more  upon  memory,  the  "Analogy"  upon 
thought. 

I  cannot  say  what  value  I  attach  to  Bishop  Butler's  works. 
Viewing  him  as  a  guide  of  life,  especially  for  the  intellectual 
difficulties  and  temptations  of  these  times,  I  place  him  be- 
fore almost  any  other  author.  The  spirit  of  wisdom  is  in 
every  line.* 

•"Life  of  William  Ewaxt  Gladstone,"  by  John  Morley,  Macmillan 
Co.,  Vol.  I.,  p.  209. 

* "  Correq)ondence, "  etc.,  VoL  II.,  p.  163. 


ACCORDING  TO  GLADSTONE   183 

Tlie  great  factor  in  education,  however,  in  the 
judgment  of  Gladstone,  is  found  in  the  classical 
tradition,  and  his  regard  for  this  tradition  was  far 
more  fundamental  than  that  he  entertained  for 
either  mathematics  or  metaphysics.  In  the  year 
1861  Mr.  Gladstone  writes  Lord  Littleton : 

The  low  utilitarian  argument  in  matter  of  education,  for 
giving  it  what  is  termed  a  practical  direction,  is  so  plausible 
that  I  think  we  may  on  the  whole  be  thankful  that  the  in- 
stincts of  the  country  have  resisted  what  in  argument  it 
has  been  ill  able  to  confute.  We  still  hold  by  the  classical 
training  as  the  basis  of  a  liberal  education;  parents  dispose 
of  their  children  in  early  youth  accordingly;  but  if  they 
were  asked  why  they  did  so,  it  is  probable  they  would  give 
lamentably  weak  or  unworthy  reasons  for  it,  such  for  ex- 
ample, as  that  the  public  schools  and  universities  open  the 
way  to  desirable  acquaintance  and  what  is  termed  "good 
society."  .  .  . 

But  why  after  all  is  the  classical  training  paramount?  Is 
it  because  we  find  it  established?  because  it  improves  mem- 
ory or  taste,  or  gives  precision,  or  develops  the  faculty  of 
speech?  All  these  are  but  partial  and  fragmentary  state- 
ments, so  many  narrow  glimpses  of  a  great  and  comprehensive 
truth.  That  truth  I  take  to  be  that  the  modern  European  civ- 
ilization from  the  middle  age  downwards  is  the  compound 
of  two  great  factors,  the  Christian  religion  for  the  spirit  of 
man,  and  the  Greek,  and  in  a  secondary  degree  the  Roman 
discipline  for  his  mind  and  intellect.  St.  Paul  is  the  apostle 
of  the  Gentiles,  and  is  in  his  own  person  a  symbol  of  this 
great  wedding — the  place,  for  example,  of  Aristotle  and  Plato 


184  EDUCATION 

in  Christian  education  is  not  arbitrary  nor  in  principle 
mutable.  The  materials  of  what  we  call  classical  training 
were  prepared,  and  we  have  a  right  to  say  were  advisedly 
prepared,  in  order  that  it  might  become  not  a  mere  adjunct 
but  (in  mathematical  phrase)  the  complement  of  Christianity 
in  its  application  to  the  culture  of  the  human  being  formed 
both  for  this  world  and  for  the  world  to  come. 

If  this  principle  be  true  it  is  broad  and  high  and  clear 
enough,  and  supplies  a  key  to  all  questions  connected  with 
the  relation  between  the  classical  training  of  our  youth  and 
all  other  branches  of  their  secular  education.  It  must  of 
course  be  kept  within  its  proper  place,  and  duly  limited  as 
to  things  and  persons.  It  can  only  apply  in  full  to  that  small 
proportion  of  the  youth  of  any  country,  who  are  to  become 
in  the  fullest  sense  educated  men.  It  involves  no  extravagant 
or  inconvenient  assumptions  respecting  those  who  are  to  be 
educated  for  trades  and  professions  in  which  the  necessities 
of  specific  training  must  limit  general  culture.  It  leaves 
open  every  question  turning  upon  individual  aptitudes  and 
inaptitudes  and  by  no  means  requires  that  boys  without  a 
capacity  for  imbibing  any  of  the  spirit  of  classical  culture 
are  stiU  to  be  mechanically  plied  with  the  instruments  of  it 
after  their  unfitness  has  become  manifest.  But  it  lays  down 
the  rule  of  education  for  those  who  have  no  internal  and 
no  external  disqualification;  and  that  rule,  becoming  a  fixed 
and  central  point  in  the  system,  becomes  also  the  point  around 
which  all  others  may  be  grouped.^ 

The  classical  training  was  thought  to  be  of  value 
by  Mr.  Gladstone  not  only  because  of  its  literary 

»"Life  of,"  etc.,  Vol.  n.,  pp.  646-648. 


ACCORDING  TO  GLADSTONE   185 

elements  but  also  because  of  its  philosophical  im- 
port.   To  his  eldest  son  he  writes  in  1860,  saying : 

In  my  opinion  the  "Politics"  of  Aristotle  are  much  more 
adapted  for  discipline  to  the  mind  of  the  young,  and  espe* 
cially  to  your  mind,  than  the  "Republic"  of  Plato.  The 
merit  of  Plato's  philosophy  is  in  a  quasi-spiritual  and  highly 
imaginative  element  that  runs  through  it;  Aristotle's  deals 
in  a  most  sharp,  searching,  and  faithful  analysis  of  the  facts 
of  human  life  and  human  nature.  All  the  reasons  that  have 
bound  Aristotle  so  wonderfully  to  Oxford  should,  I  think, 
recommend  him  to  you.  Were  I  to  determine  your  study,  I 
should  say.  Take  for  the  present  some  lighter  specimen  of 
Plato,  and  nothing  more.  .  .  .  The  "Politics"  will  require 
much  from  you  in  thought  and  energy :  I  think  the  *  *  Repub- 
lic" would  be  lighter  as  well  as  less  valuable  work.  .  .  .• 

Although  Mr.  Gladstone  gave  a  higher  place  to 
Greek  than  to  Latin  in  classical  education,  he  did 
place  a  high  worth  upon  the  writing  of  Latin.  He 
says,  in  a  note  to  his  son  of  the  year  1853 : 

The  art  of  writing  really  good  Latin  prose  is  a  very  diffi- 
cult one,  and  possessed  by  few  persons,  you  can  only  advance 
towards  it  by  slow  degrees ;  but  it  is  a  most  valuable  accom- 
plishment, and  helps  much  in  making  up  the  character  of  a 
scholar  and  a  gentleman  by  its  refining  effect  upon  taste  and 
judgment  in  expression.  It  is  an  admirable  preparation  for 
writing  good  English.'' 

•"Correspondence,"  etc..  Vol.  II.,  p.  164. 
»/6»d.,  p.  151. 


186  EDUCATION 

It  cannot,  however,  for  one  moment  be  doubted 
that  the  great  element  of  education  intellectual,  in 
the  judgment  of  Gladstone,  is  religion.  Himself  a 
great  believer,  **a  great  Christian,"  as  Lord  Salis- 
bury called  him  after  his  death,  he  esteemed  the 
attitude  toward  religion — and  to  him  the  only  re- 
ligion was  the  Christian — as  of  primary  intellec- 
tual significance.  In  the  troublesome  period  of 
1854,  when  university  reform  was  in  the  air,  he 
would  have  been  glad  to  have  made  Oxford  more 
religious  and  more  theological.  Pusey,  in  his  ^ '  Col- 
legiate and  Professorial  Teaching  and  Discipline," 
has  a  passage  elevating  the  doctrine  of  God  to  a 
primary  place  in  his  scheme  of  education: 

God  alone  ...  is  in  Himself,  and  is  the  Cause  and  Up- 
holder of  everything  to  which  He  has  given  being.  Every 
faculty  of  the  mind  is  some  reflection  of  His ;  every  truth  has 
its  being  from  Him;  every  law  of  Nature  has  the  impress  of 
His  hand ;  everything  beautiful  has  caught  its  light  from  His 
eternal  beauty ;  every  principle  of  goodness  has  its  foundation 
in  His  attributes.  ,  .  .  History,  without  God,  is  a  chaos  with- 
out design,  or  end,  or  aim;  political  economy,  without  God, 
would  be  a  selfish  teaching  for  the  acquisition  of  wealth; 
physics,  without  God,  would  be  but  a  dull  inquiry  into  cer- 
tain meaningless  phenomena;  ethics,  without  God,  would  be 
a  varying  rule,  without  principle,  or  substance,  or  centre,  or 
regulating  hand ;  metaphysics,  without  God,  would  make  man^ 


ACCORDING  TO  GLADSTONE   187 

his  own  temporary  god,  to  be  resolved,  after  his  brief  hour 
here,  into  the  nothingness  out  of  which  he  proceeded." 

Such  is  Mr.  Gladstone's  own  conception  of  the 
place  of  religion  in  education.  The  theology  which 
he  represents  is  also  of  a  pretty  strict  type.  In 
the  year  1865  he  writes : 

I  would  rather  see  Oxford  level  with  the  ground  than  its 
religion  regulated  in  the  manner  which  would  please  Bishop 
Colenso." 

Mr.  Gladstone's  conception  of  the  place  of  re- 
ligion in  education  is  especially  expounded  in  his 
letters  to  his  children.  To  his  son  Harry  in  the 
year  1868  he  writes : 

I  am  much  concerned  that  my  duties  here  should  be  so 
pressing  at  this  moment  as  to  prevent  my  going  down  to 
Eton  to-morrow  and  joining  my  prayers  to  your  dear  moth- 
er's that  the  grace  of  God  may  abundantly  descend  upon  you, 
both  in  the  holy  ordinance  of  Confirmation,  and  afterwards 
through  all  the  days  of  your  life.  I  shall  do  my  best  to 
recollect  you  from  hence;  and  among  other  satisfactions  I 
am  truly  glad  that  you  should  be  confirmed  by  the  Bishop 
of  Oxford,  who  far  exceeds  all  the  prelates  I  have  ever  heard 
in  the  wise  and  devout  impressiveness  of  his  administration 
of  that  particular  rite. 

But  I  look  most  to  what  lies  within  your  own  breast.  It 
is  in  the  preparation  of  the  heart  that  the  surest  promise 

•T&td.,  VoL  I.,  p.  211. 
*Ibid.,  p.  220. 


188  EDUCATION 

as  to  this  and  every  other  ordinance  is  to  be  found:  in  the 
humility  and  self-mistrust,  in  the  continual  looking  up  to 
God,  the  silent  prayer  of  the  soul,  for  help  and  strength,  in 
the  manful  resolution,  resting  on  the  hope  of  His  aid,  to  fol- 
low right,  conscience,  honour,  duty,  truth,  holiness,  "through 
all  the  changes  and  chances  of  this  mortal  life, ' '  and  whether 
others  will  walk  with  us  or  whether  they  will  not.^" 

To  his  daughter  Helen,  two  years  earlier,  he 
writes : 

The  duty  to  be  done,  the  progress  to  be  made,  the  good  to 
be  effected,  the  store  to  be  laid  up  for  the  future,  from  day 
to  day,  from  hour  to  hour,  make  life  a  solemn  thing,  and  the 
first  of  all  our  duties  is  that  the  life  of  each  of  us  should 
have  a  purpose,  namely,  the  fulfilment  of  the  Divine  will, 
by  steady  exertion  aimed  at  this  object,  that  so  far  as  de- 
pends upon  us  the  sum  of  sin  in  the  world,  and  in  ourselves 
especially,  shall  be  lessened  by  the  work  of  our  lives,  and 
not  increased.  Pursue  this  end,  my  dearest  child,  under  an 
ever-living  sense  of  the  presence  of  God  with  you,  and,  of 
your  union  with  Christ,  and  may  you  in  pursuing  it  have 
ever-increasing  progress  in  overcoming  evil  and  infirmity, 
and  in  working  out  the  holy  will  of  God.^^ 

Four  years  later  upon  her  coming  of  age  he 
writes  to  her  to  the  same  intent,  saying : 

God  has  been  liberal  to  you  in  capacity,  and  I  trust  you  will 
render  it  all  back  to  Him  in  good  works  done  to  your  fellow- 
creatures,  in  the  cultivation  of  your  own  mind,  and  in  bring- 

"J6w2.,  VoLIL,  p.  185. 
»»Z6td.,  p.  191. 


ACCORDING  TO  GLADSTONE   189 

ing  your  whole  heart  and  life   into  conformity  with  the 
blessed  Pattern  given  us." 

With  rather  complete  fullness  is  his  conception 
of  the  worth  of  religion  in  education  outlined  in 
certain  specific  prayers  and  counsels  written  for 
his  eldest  son.  From  a  multitude  of  themes  I  select 
these  brief  counsels : 

This  sense  of  God's  presence  will  both  help  and  be  helped 
by  the  practice  of  prayer  by  silent  ejaculation,  or  inwardly 
addressing  God  in  short  sentences,  though  of  but  two  or 
three  words:  although  so  short,  their  wings  may  be  strong 
enough  to  carry  upwards  many  a  fervent  desire  and  earnest 
seeking  after  God.  .  .  . 

Remember  that  the  avoidance  of  sin,  indispensable  as  it  is, 
is  the  lower  part  of  our  religion :  from  which  we  should  ever 
be  striving  onwards  to  the  higher — namely,  the  life  of  Di- 
vine love,  fed  continually  by  the  contemplation  of  God  as 
He  is  revealed  to  us  in  Christ,  nowhere  better  described  in 
brief  than  by  the  Psalmist  when  he  says:  "As  for  me,  I 
will  behold  Thy  presence  in  righteousness :  and  when  I  awake 
up  after  Thy  likeness  I  shall  be  satisfied  with  it" — ^words 
which,  like  most  words  of  Scripture,  open  deeper  and  more 
satisfying  truths  the  more  we  humbly  ponder  them.*' 

Such  is  the  concept  of  education  which  the  Great 
Commoner,  the  first  citizen  of  the  world,  for  his 
prolonged  generation,  held.  It  is  an  education 
composed  of  mathematics  and  metaphysics  in  a 

"Ibid.,  p.  193. 
"  Ibid.,  p.  413. 


190  EDUCATION 

small  degree,  of  Latin  and  Greek  in  a  greater  meas- 
ure, and  of  the  counsels  and  elements  of  religion  in 
the  largest  part.  If  religion  is  not  the  formal  con- 
tent, it  is  more.  It  is  the  atmosphere  which  moves 
and  colors,  gives  direction  and  inspires  impulse  for 
every  other  part  of  the  whole  educational  system. 
As  to  the  method  in  education,  too,  which  the 
Great  Commoner  believed  in,  are  found  two  or 
three  significant  notes.  The  method  in  education 
which  Mr.  Gladstone  emphasized,  and  practised 
from  earliest  years  to  latest,  lies  simply  in  the  word 
**work."  A  tremendous  worker  himself,  he 
preached  work  as  the  condition  and  way  of  seeking 
education.  His  earliest  diaries  show  the  value 
which  he  attached  to  it  and  his  latest  statements 
and  lasting  practise  do  not  at  all  contradict  them. 
The  diary  which  he  wrote  in  the  year  1830,  at  the 
age  of  twenty-one,  is  full  of  evidences  of  his  labori- 
ousness ;  and  a  generation  later  he  was  counseling 
his  eldest  son  likewise  to  be  a  good  worker. 

Try  and  reconcile  your  mind  thoroughly  to  the  idea  that 
this  world,  if  we  would  be  well  and  do  well  in  it,  is  a  world 
of  work  and  not  of  idleness.  This  idea  will,  when  heartily 
embraced,  become  like  a  part  of  yourself,  and  you  will  feel 
that  you  would  on  no  account  have  it  torn  from  you.^* 

"26id.,  p.  160. 


ACCORDING  TO  GLADSTONE   191 

Again,  he  says  to  his  son  who  has  become  a  stu- 
dent of  Christ  Church : 

If  you  look  at  the  chief  portraits  in  Hall,  you  will  see 
with  what  manner  and  calibre  of  men  you  are  associated. 
Neither  is  there  any  reason  why  you  for  yourself  should  not 
leave  behind  you  a  name  with  which  in  after-times  others 
may  be  happy  to  claim  fellowship:  only  be  assured  it  must 
be  on  the  same  condition  as  Nature  lays  down  for  all  except 
her  prodigies,  or,  in  other  words,  as  God  ordains  for  His 
children  in  general — the  condition,  I  mean,  of  steady  and 
hard  work.  If  I  may  recommend  you  a  mode  in  which  to 
inaugurate  your  studentship,  I  would  say  add  an  hour  to 
your  daily  mimmum  of  work.  Besides  the  good  it  will  do 
you,  it  is  a  double  acknowledgment — first  to  GK)d,  who  has 
blessed  your  exertions;  and  secondly  to  the  poor  old  Col- 
lege, to  which  I  must  be  ever  grateful,  and  whose  fame  I 
fondly  hope  you  in  your  sphere  will  do  something  to  restore 
and  to  increase.^' 

It  may  also  be  said  that  Mr.  Gladstone  did  not 
depreciate  the  value  of  what  is  known  as  cram- 
ming.   He  tells  his  son  that 

It  is  not  well  to  found  a  course  of  education  on  the  idea  of 
loading  the  memory ;  but  now  is  the  moment  for  you  to  load 
your  memory  as  heavily  as  you  can  without  stint — much  can 
be  carried  for  a  short  distance  that  cannot  be  for  a  long 
one.  It  is  very  convenient  at  such  a  time  to  have  the  eye 
able  to  run  over  maps  and  refresh  the  memory  on  cardinal 
or  imperfectly  known  points  of  geography.     Especially  at 

»/6id.,  p.  162. 


192  EDUCATION 

this  time  I  should  say  work  up  well  all  the  crack  passages: 
those  which  concentrate  much  meaning  in  few  words;  those 
which  give  characteristic  and  pointed  illustration  of  the 
characters  of  the  authors,  or  of  their  race,  country,  or  in- 
stitutions. I  think  you  will  find  the  collection  of  these  pas- 
sages in  my  little  red  books  pretty  good :  they  were  of  great 
service  to  me,  for  which  I  love  them,  and  I  shall  love  them 
better  if  they  can  now  do  you  a  good  turn.^® 

In  this  process  of  education  that  primarily  Eng- 
lish institution  known  as  the  examination  had  for 
him  great  worth.  Of  it  he  says  in  an  address  given 
at  Manchester  in  the  year  1862 : 

It  raises  to  a  maxdmum  that  stimulus  which  acts  insensibly 
but  powerfully  upon  the  minds  of  students,  as  it  were,  from 
behind ;  and  becomes  an  auxiliary  force  augmenting  their  en- 
ergies, and  helping  them,  almost  without  their  knowledge, 
to  surmount  their  difficulties.  It  is  not  found  in  practice,  so 
far  as  I  know,  to  be  open  to  an  objection  which  is  popularly 
urged  against  it;  this,  namely,  that  it  may  elicit  evil  pas- 
sions among  the  candidates,  because  it  makes  the  gain  of 
one  the  loss  of  another,  I  believe  that,  on  the  contrary,  the 
pursuit  of  knowledge  is  found  to  carry  with  it,  in  this  respect, 
its  own  preservatives  and  safeguards.  Even  in  athletic 
sports,  the  loser  does  not  resent  or  grudge  the  fairly  won 
honours  of  the  winner;  and,  in  the  race  of  minds,  those  who 
are  behind,  having  confidence  in  the  perfect  fairness  of  the 
award,  are  not  so  blindly  and  basely  selfish  as  to  cherish  re- 
sentment against  others  for  being  better  than  themselves. 
Again,  it  is  a  recommendation  of  purely  competitive  exami- 

"liid..  p.  165. 


ACCORDING  TO  GLADSTONE        193 

nations  that  they  bring  the  matter  to  the  simplest  issue ;  for, 
in  nice  cases,  it  is  a  much  easier  and  safer  task  for  the  ex- 
aminer to  compare  the  performances  of  a  candidate  with 
those  of  another  candidate,  than  to  compare  them  with  some 
more  abstract  standard,  existing  only  in  his  own  mind." 

The  high  worth  which  Mr.  Gladstone  placed  upon 
education  is  indicated  in  many  ways.  He  called 
Oxford  and  Cambridge  the  "two  eyes  of  the  coun- 
try." ^*  His  solicitude  for  them  was  constant  and 
great.  He  believed  that  the  connection  between  the 
mind  of  a  nation  and  its  education  is  vital.  He 
loved  Oxford  as  he  loved  his  mother.  His  farewell 
message  to  Oxford,  as  he  drew  near  his  end,  voiced 
his  earnest  prayers  **to  the  uttermost  and  to  the 
last"  for  her. 

Two  generations  after  he  left  the  university,  Mr. 
Gladstone  interpreted  her  influence  upon  him : 

Oxford  had  rather  tended  to  hide  from  me  the  great  fact 
that  liberty  is  a  great  and  precious  gift  of  God,  and  that  hu- 
man excellence  cannot  grow  up  in  a  nation  without  it.  And 
yet  I  do  not  hesitate  to  say  that  Oxford  had  even  at  this  time 
laid  the  foundations  of  my  liberalism.  School  pursuits  had 
revealed  little;  but  in  the  region  of  philosophy  she  had  in- 
itiated if  not  inured  me  to  the  pursuit  of  truth  as  an  end 
of  study.    The  splendid  integrity  of  Aristotle,  and  still  more 

""Gleanings  of  Past  Years,"  by  the  Eight  Hon.  William  Ewart 
Gladstone,  M.  P.,  Charles  Seribner's  Sons,  Vol.  I.,  p.  15. 
""Life  of,"  etc.,  Vol.  III.,  p.  486. 


194  EDUCATION 

of  Butler,  conferred  upon  me  an  inestimable  service.  Else- 
where I  have  not  scrupled  to  speak  with  severity  of  myself, 
but  I  declare  that  while  in  the  arms  of  Oxford,  I  was  possessed 
through  and  through  with  a  single-minded  and  passionate  love 
of  truth,  with  a  virgin  love  of  truth,  so  that,  although  I  might 
be  swathed  in  clouds  of  prejudice  there  was  something  of  an 
eye  within,  that  might  gradually  pierce  them.*' 

But  as  Mr.  Gladstone  looked  back  upon  Oxford 
in  the  later  years,  he  traced  one  great  defect  in  her 
education. 

Perhaps  it  was  my  own  fault,  but  I  must  admit  that  I 
did  not  learn  when  I  was  at  Oxford  that  which  I  have 
learned  since — namely,  to  set  a  due  value  on  the  imperish- 
able and  inestimable  principle  of  British  liberty.  The  tem- 
per which  too  much  prevailed  in  academical  circles  was  that 
liberty  was  regarded  with  jealousy  and  fear,  something  which 
could  not  wholly  be  dispensed  with,  but  which  was  to  be  con- 
tinually watched  for  fear  of  excesses.'^" 

In  the  year  1860,  delivering  his  inaugural  ad- 
dress as  rector  of  Edinburgh,  he  says : 

Let  me  remind  you  how  one  of  European  fame,  who  is 
now  your  and  my  academical  superior,  how  the  great  jurist, 
orator,  philosopher  and  legislator,  who  is  our  Chancellor,  how 
Lord  Brougham  besought  the  youth  of  Glasgow,  as  I  in 
his  words  would  more  feebly,  but  not  less  earnestly,  pray 
you,  "to  believe  how  incomparably  the  present  season  is 
verily  and  indeed  the  most  precious  of  your  whole  lives," 

"7&id.,  Vol.  I.,  p.  84. 
"Ibid.,  p.  60. 


ACCORDING  TO  GLADSTONE   195 

and  how  "every  hour  you  squander  here  will,"  in  other 
days,  "rise  up  against  you,  and  be  paid  for  by  years  of 
bitter  but  unavailing  regrets."  Let  me  recall  to  you  the 
words  of  another  Lord  Rector  of  Glasgow,  whose  name  is 
cherished  in  every  cottage  of  his  country,  and  whose  strong 
sagacity,  vast  range  of  experience,  and  energy  of  will,  were 
not  one  whit  more  eminent  than  the  tenderness  of  his  con- 
science, and  his  ever  wakeful  and  wearing  sense  of  public 
duty.  Let  me  remind  you  how  Sir  Robert  Peel,  choosing 
from  his  quiver  with  a  congenial  forethought  that  shaft 
which  was  most  likely  to  strike  home,  averred  before  the 
same  academic  audience  what  may  as  safely  be  declared  to 
you,  that  "there  is  a  presumption,  amounting  almost  to 
certainty,  that  if  any  one  of  you  will  determine  to  be  eminent 
in  whatever  profession  you  may  choose,  and  will  act  with 
unvarying  steadiness  in  pursuance  of  that  determination, 
you  will,  if  health  and  strength  be  given  to  you,  infallibly 
succeed.  * '  *^ 

"  ' '  GleaningB  of  Past  Years, ' '  etc.,  VoL  VII.,  pp.  24-25. 


VI 

EDUCATION  ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD 

MATTHEW  ARNOLD  was  a  critic  of  litera- 
ture: a  critic  so  large  and  so  fine,  that  Ms 
criticism  itself  has  become  literature.  He  was  also 
a  poet,  and  it  now  seems  not  improbable  that  the 
future  will  include  his  name  in  that  trinity  of  Eng- 
lish poets  which  helped  to  make  illustrious  the  last 
half  of  the  nineteenth  century.  He  was  too  an 
inspector  of  English  schools,  an  educationist,  and 
to  his  work  he  gave  wisdom,  strength,  vision  and 
pains  of  all  sorts.  Both  as  cause  and  result  of  his 
educational  service  he  wrote  much  on  education, 
presenting  facts  as  well  as  analyzing  principles  and 
theories.  But  whether  as  critic  or  as  poet  or  as  edu- 
cationist, he  was  always  an  interpreter — an  inter- 
preter of  life.  He  tried  to  see  life  sanely  and  to  see 
it  whole.  He  was  sincere,  full  of  charm,  relying 
upon  the  power  of  persuasion  to  get  the  results  he 
so  eagerly  desired.  He  loved  nature,  children  and 
animals.  He  praised  as  well  as  condemned.  He 
had  humor  as  well  as  wit,  enjoyed  fun  and  endured 

196 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD     197 

trial  without  complaint.  Laborious,  he  found 
recreation  in  many  forms  of  service.  Serene,  he 
delighted  in  every  kind  of  human  interest.  Seek- 
ing for  truth,  he  lived  it,  and  was  loyal  to  its  duties. 
In  him  was  a  sweet  reasonableness  which,  together 
with  his  other  great  qualities,  causes  his  interpreta- 
tion of  education  to  be  of  precious  worth. 

His  sum  of  thoughts  about  education  is  no  more 
orderly  and  logical  and  consistent  than  Emerson's. 
Frederic  Harrison  says  of  him  in  the  year  1867 : 

We  seek  vainly  in  Mr.  Arnold  a  system  of  philosophy  with 
principles  coherent,  interdependent,  subordinate,  and  deriva- 
tive. 

If  ** education"  were  substituted  for  "philoso- 
phy," the  remark  would  be  quite  as  true.  And  yet 
it  is  not  difficult  from  the  many  volumes  of  his 
writings  to  select  certain  great  and  generally  con- 
sistent interpretations. 

These  interpretations  are  concerned,  first,  with 
a  definition  of  education ;  second,  with  the  kind  of 
education  needed  for  different  classes  in  the  com- 
munity; third,  with  the  content  of  education; 
fourth,  with  methods;  fifth,  with  administration; 
sixth,  with  the  training  of  teachers ;  seventh,  with 
ithe  worth  or  worthlessness  of  examinations. 


198  EDUCATION 

The  definition  of  education  whicli  Mr.  Arnold 
gives  is  not  dogmatic.  It  is  rather  inquisitive, 
characterizing,  descriptive.  He  says  of  the  com- 
pass of  education : 

The  ideal  of  a  general,  liberal  training,  is  to  carry  us  to 
a  knowledge  of  ourselves  and  the  world.  We  are  called  to 
this  knowledge  by  special  aptitudes  which  are  born  with  us; 
the  grand  thing  in  teaching  is  to  have  faith  that  some  apti- 
tudes of  this  kind  every  one  has.  This  one's  special  apti- 
tudes are  for  knowing  men — the  study  of  the  humanities; 
that  one's  special  aptitudes  are  for  knowing  the  world — the 
study  of  nature.  The  circle  of  knowledge  comprehends  both, 
and  we  should  all  have  some  notion,  at  any  rate,  of  the 
whole  circle  of  knowledge.  The  rejection  of  the  humanities 
by  the  realists,  the  rejection  of  the  study  of  nature  by  the 
humanists,  are  alike  ignorant.  He  whose  aptitudes  carry 
him  to  the  study  of  nature  should  have  some  notion  of  the 
humanities;  he  whose  aptitudes  carry  him  to  the  humanities 
should  have  some  notion  of  the  phenomena  and  laws  of 
nature.* 

Into  his  definition  of  education  Mr.  Arnold  does 
not  admit  any  sort  of  common  narrowness  or  limi- 
tation. The  type  embraces  both  the  moral  char- 
acter and  the  intellect  of  the  individual.    He  says  : 

In  modern  epochs,  the  part  of  a  high  reason,  of  ideas,  ac- 
quires constantly  increasing  importance  in  the  conduct  of 
the  world's  affairs.    A  fine  culture  is  the  complement  of  a 

*  *  *  Higher  Schools  and  Universities  in  Germany, ' '  p.  175. 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD    199 

high  reason,  and  it  is  in  the  conjunction  of  both  with  char- 
acter, with  energy,  that  the  ideal  for  men  and  nations  is 
placed.  It  is  common  to  hear  remarks  on  the  frequent  di- 
vorce between  culture  and  character,  and  to  infer  from  this 
that  culture  is  a  mere  varnish,  and  that  character  only  de- 
serves any  serious  attention.  No  error  can  be  more  fatal: 
culture  without  character  is,  no  doubt,  something  frivolous, 
vain,  and  weak,  but  character  without  culture  is,  on  the 
other  hand,  something  raw,  blind,  and  dangerous:  the  most 
interesting,  the  most  truly  glorious  peoples,  are  those  in 
which  the  alliance  of  the  two  has  been  effected  most  suc- 
cessfully, and  its  result  spread  most  widely.* 

The  emphasis  upon  character  does  not  detract 
from  the  emphasis  on  culture.  Culture  is  the  need 
of  all.  The  poor  demand  it  quite  as  much  as  the 
rich,  and  the  rich  need  it  quite  as  much  as  the  poor. 
When  culture  is  defined  as  the  acquainting  our- 
selves **with  the  best  which  has  been  thought  and 
said  in  the  world,'*  it  becomes  plain  that  it  is  or 
should  be  made  a  universal  possession.  For  secur- 
ing it  reading  is  the  most  effective  method. 

But,  secondly,  education  is  to  be  adjusted  to  the 
needs  of  persons.  The  education  most  profitable 
for  one  class  of  the  community  may  not  be  profit- 
able for  another  class.    The  question  most  impor- 

*"The  Popular  Education  of  Prance,  with  Notices  of  that  of  Hol- 
land and  Switzerand,"  p.  zliii. 


200  EDIJCATION 

taut  to  Matthew  Arnold,  as  to  Herbert  Spencer,  is 
the  question  of  relative  worth. 

Social  classes  in  England  are  differentiated  more 
highly  than  in  any  other  country.  Each  class  has 
its  own  special  weakness  or  peril : 

Far  more  than  by  the  helplessness  of  an  aristocracy  whose 
day  is  fast  coming  to  an  end,  far  more  than  by  the  rawness 
of  a  lower  class  whose  day  is  only  just  beginning,  we  are  em- 
perilled  by  what  I  call  the  "Philistinism"  of  our  middle 
class.  On  the  side  of  beauty  and  taste,  vulgarity;  on  the 
side  of  morals  and  feeling,  coarseness;  on  the  side  of  mind 
and  spirit,  unintelligence — ^this  is  Philistinism.^ 

Now  for  these  different  classes  the  one  common 
advantage  to  be  offered  is  education,  and  education 
adjusted  to  the  need  of  each  class : 

It  seems  to  me  that,  for  the  class  frequenting  Eton,  the 
grand  aim  of  education  should  be  to  give  them  those  good 
things  which  their  birth  and  rearing  are  least  likely  to  give 
them,  to  give  them  (besides  mere  book-learning)  the  notion 
of  a  sort  of  republican  fellowship,  the  practice  of  a  plain 
life  in  common,  the  habit  of  self-help.  To  the  middle  class, 
the  grand  aim  of  education  should  be  to  give  largeness  of 
soul  and  personal  dignity;  to  the  lower  class,  feeling,  gen- 
tleness, humanity.* 

•"The  Study  of  Celtic  Literature,"  Intr.,  ix. 
*"A  French  Eton,"  p.  62. 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD    201 

In  other  words,  Mr.  Arnold  says  that  education 
should  have  the  element  of  proportion.  With  un- 
usual power  and  discrimination  he  writes: 

Da  mihi,  Domiiie,  scire  quod  sciendum  est,  "Grant  that 
the  knowledge  I  get  may  be  the  knowledge  which  is  worth 
liaving!" — the  spirit  of  that  prayer  ought  to  rule  our  edu- 
cation. How  little  it  does  rule  it,  every  discerning  man 
will  acknowledge.  Life  is  short,  and  our  faculties  of  atten- 
tion and  of  recollection  are  limited;  in  education  we  pro- 
ceed as  if  our  life  were  endless,  and  our  powers  of  atten- 
tion and  recollection  inexhaustible.  We  have  not  time  or 
strength  to  deal  with  half  of  the  matters  which  are  thrown 
upon  our  minds ;  they  prove  a  useless  load  to  us.  When  some 
one  talked  to  Themistocles  of  an  art  of  memory,  he  answered : 
* '  Teach  me  rather  to  forget ! ' '  The  sarcasm  well  criticizes  the 
fatal  want  of  proportion  between  what  we  put  into  our 
minds  and  their  real  needs  and  powers."* 

In  particular,  quoting  Plato,  he  says  to  Ameri- 
can audiences : 

"An  intelligent  man,"  says  Plato,  "will  prize  those  stud- 
ies which  result  in  his  soul  getting  soberness,  righteousness, 
and  wisdom,  and  will  less  value  the  others."  I  cannot  con- 
sider that  a  bad  description  of  the  aim  of  education,  and 
of  the  motives  which  should  govern  us  in  the  choice  of  stud- 
ies, whether  we  are  preparing  ourselves  for  a  hereditary  seat 
in  the  English  House  of  Lords  or  for  the  pork  trade  in 
Chicago." 

•Preface  to  Johnson's  "Lives  of  the  Poets." 
•"Discouraea  in  America,"  p.  78. 


202  EDUCATION 

And  at  the  same  time,  under  circumstances 
which  brought  America  especially  near  to  his  vision 
he  goes  on  to  say : 

Still  I  admit  that  Plato's  world  was  not  ours,  that  his 
scorn  of  trade  and  handicraft  is  fantastic,  that  he  had  no 
conception  of  a  great  industrial  community  such  as  that  of 
the  United  States,  and  that  such  a  community  must  and  will 
shape  its  education  to  suit  its  own  needs.  If  the  usual  edu- 
cation handed  down  to  it  from  the  past  does  not  suit  it, 
it  will  certainly  before  long  drop  this  and  try  another.  The 
usual  education  in  the  past  has  been  mainly  literary.  The 
question  is  whether  the  studies  which  were  long  supposed 
to  be  the  best  for  all  of  us  are  practically  the  best  now; 
whether  others  are  not  better.  The  tyranny  of  the  past,  many 
think,  weighs  on  us  injuriously  in  the  predominance  given  to 
letters  in  education.  The  question  is  raised  whether,  to  meet 
the  needs  of  our  modern  life,  the  predominance  ought  not  now 
to  pass  from  letters  to  science;  and  naturally  the  question 
is  nowhere  raised  with  more  energy  than  here  in  the  United 
States.  The  design  of  abasing  what  is  called  "mere  literary 
instruction  and  education,"  and  of  exalting  what  is  called 
"sound,  extensive,  and  practical  scientific  knowledge,"  is, 
in  this  intensely  modem  world  of  the  United  States,  even 
more  perhaps  than  in  Europe,  a  very  popular  design,  and 
makes  great  and  rapid  progress/ 

But  education,  whether  for  England  or  for 
America,  for  the  obscure  or  for  the  conspicuous, 
for  the  class  of  leisure  or  for  the  class  of  labor,  is  to 

»I6td.,  pp.  78-79. 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD    203 

possess  what  Pericles  calls  "a  happy  and  gracious 
flexibility."  "A  charming  gift"  this,  and  along 
with  it  go,  Mr.  Arnold  adds : 

Lucidity  of  thought,  clearness  and  propriety  of  language, 
freedom  from  prejudice  and  freedom  from  stiffness,  openness 
of  mind,  amiability  of  manners.  .  .  .* 

In  respect  to  the  content  of  education,  one  finds 
in  Matthew  Arnold  what,  on  the  whole,  one  expects 
to  find — a  keen  loyalty  to  the  scholastic  tradition. 
His  own  reading  of  Latin  and  Greek  was  broad  and 
accurate.  He  knew  his  Plato  and  his  Aristotle, 
and  among  his  "unapproachable  favorites"  were 
Homer  and  Sophocles.  He  was  himself  a  Wyke- 
hamist and  the  son  of  a  Wykehamist.  His  father 
was  the  greatest  of  head-masters.  Three  of  his 
brothers  had  been  at  his  father's  school,  and  three 
of  his  sons  he  sent  to  Harrow.  One  therefore  ex- 
pects to  find  much  laudation  and  commendation  of 
the  great  classical  literatures.  From  many  pas- 
sages I  select  the  more  pregnant. 

In  a  speech  made  at  Eton  he  says : 

What  a  man  seeks  through  his  education  is  to  get  to  know 
himself  and  the  world;  next,  that  for  this  knowledge  it  is 
before  aU  things  necessary  that  he  acquaint  himself  with 
the  best  which  has  been  thought  and  said  in  the  world ;  finally, 

•" Irish  Essays"  (A  Speech  at  Eton),  p.  187. 


204  EDUCATION 

that  of  this  best  the  classics  of  Greece  and  Rome  form  a  very 
chief  portion,  and  the  portion  most  entirely  satisfactory. 
With  these  conclusions  lodged  safe  in  one's  mind,  one  is 
staunch  on  the  side  of  the  humanities.® 

In  speaking  of  the  study  of  Latin  in  elemental}^ 
schools  he  also  says : 

It  may  seem  over-sanguine,  but  I  hope  to  see  Latin,  also, 
much  more  used  as  a  special  subject,  and  even  adopted,  finally, 
as  part  of  the  regular  instruction  in  the  upper  classes  of 
all  elementary  schools.  Of  course,  I  mean  Latin  studied  in 
a  very  simple  way ;  but  I  am  more  and  more  struck  with  the 
stimulating  and  instructing  effect  upon  a  child's  mind  of 
possessing  a  second  language,  in  however  limited  a  degree,  as 
an  object  of  reference  and  comparison.  Latin  is  the  foun- 
dation of  so  much  in  the  written  and  spoken  language  of 
modem  Europe,  that  it  is  the  best  language  to  take  as  a 
second  language;  in  our  own  written  and  book  language, 
above  all,  it  fills  so  large  a  part  that  we,  perhaps,  hardly  know 
how  much  of  their  reading  falls  meaningless  upon  the  eye 
and  ear  of  children  in  our  elementary  schools,  from  their 
total  ignorance  of  either  Latin  or  a  modern  language  de- 
rived from  it.  For  the  little  of  languages  that  can  be  taught 
in  our  elementary  schools,  it  is  far  better  to  go  to  the  root 
at  once;  and  Latin,  besides,  is  the  best  of  all  languages  to 
learn  grammar  by.  But  it  should  by  no  means  be  taught 
as  in  our  classical  schools;  far  less  time  should  be  spent  on 
the  grammatical  framework,  and  classical  literature  should 
be  left  quite  out  of  view.  A  second  language,  and  a  language 
coming  very  largely  into  the  vocabulary  of  modem  nations, 

'Ihid.,  p.  184. 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD     205 

is  what  Latin  should  stand  for  to  the  teacher  of  an  elemen- 
tary school.^" 

He  also  remarks  and  more  radically,  speaking 
of  the  study  of  Latin  as  an  initiation  into  the  spirit 
of  the  ancient  world : 

The  close  appropriation  of  the  models,  which  is  necessary 
for  good  Latin  or  Greek  composition,  not  only  conduces  to 
accurate  and  verbal  scholarship ;  it  may  beget,  besides,  an  in- 
timate sense  of  those  models,  which  makes  us  sharers  of  their 
spirit  and  power;  and  this  is  of  the  essence  of  true  Alter- 
thumsiuissenschaft.  Herein  lies  the  reason  for  giving  boys 
more  of  Latin  composition  than  of  Greek,  superior  though 
the  Greek  literature  be  to  the  Latin;  but  the  power  of  the 
Latin  classic  is  in  character,  that  of  the  Greek  is  in  beauty. 
Now,  character  is  capable  of  being  taught,  learnt,  and  as- 
similated; beauty  hardly;  and  it  is  for  enabling  us  to  learn 
and  catch  some  power  of  antiquity,  that  Greek  or  Latin  com- 
position is  most  to  be  valued.  Who  shall  say  what  share  the 
turning  over  and  over  in  their  mind,  and  masticating,  so 
to  speak,  in  early  life  as  models  for  their  Latin  verse,  such 
things  as  Virgil's 

"Disce,  puer,  virtutem  ex  me,  verumque  laborem" — 
or  Horace's 

* '  Fortuna  saevo  laeta  negotio '  * — 
has  not  had  in  forming  the  high  spirit  of  the  upper  class 
in  France  and  England,  the  two  countries  where  Latin  verse 
has  most  ruled  the  schools,  and  the  two  countries  which  most 
have  had,  or  have,  a  high  upper  class  and  a  high  upper  class 

*•"  Reports  on  Elementary  Schools,  1872,"  p.  164. 


206  EDUCATION 

spirit?    All  this  is  no  doubt  to  be  considered  when  we  are 
judging  the  worth  of  the  old  school  training.^^ 

The  value  of  the  classical  training  is  further 
emphasized  by  Mr.  Arnold's  reference  to  his  own 
experience  and  observation  in  Germany: 

Dr.  Jager,  the  director  of  the  united  school, — ^well-placed, 
therefore,  for  judging,  and,  as  I  have  said,  an  able  man, — 
assured  me  it  was  the  universal  conviction  with  those  com- 
petent to  form  an  opinion,  that  the  Bealschulen  were  not,  at 
present,  successful  institutions.  He  declared  that  the  boys 
in  the  corresponding  forms  of  the  classical  school  beat  the 
Bealschule  boys  in  matters  which  both  do  alike,  such  as 
history,  geography,  the  mother-tongue,  and  even  French, 
though  to  French  the  Realschule  boys  devote  so  far  more 
time  than  their  comrades  of  the  classical  school.  The  rea- 
son for  this,  Dr.  Jager  affirms,  is  that  the  classical  training 
strengthens  a  boy's  mind  so  much  more. 

This  is  what,  as  I  have  already  said,  the  chief  school 
authorities  everywhere  in  France  and  Germany  testify:  I 
quote  Dr.  Jager 's  testimony  in  particular,  because  of  his 
ability  and  because  of  his  double  experience.  In  Switzerland 
you  do  not  hear  the  same  story,  but  the  regnant  Swiss  con- 
ception of  secondary  instruction  is,  in  general,  not  a  liberal 
but  a  commercial  one ;  not  culture  and  training  of  the  mind, 
but  what  will  be  of  immediate  palpable  utility  in  some  prac- 
tical calling,  is  there  the  chief  m,atter ;  and  this  cannot  be  ad- 
mitted as  the  true  scope  of  secondary  instruction.^^ 

""Higher  Schools  and  Universities  in  Germany,"  pp.  168-169. 
"I6id.,  pp.  131—132. 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD    207 

The  knowing  of  Latin  and  Greek  in  the  sense  Mr. 
Arnold  puts  upon  it  is  not  something  slight.  It 
represents  thoroughness  of  training.    He  says : 

When  we  talk  of  knowing  Greek  and  Roman  antiquity,  for 
instance,  which  is  the  knowledge  people  have  called  the 
humanities,  I  for  my  part  mean  a  knowledge  which  is  some- 
thing more  than  a  superficial  humanism,  mainly  decorative. 
*'I  call  all  teaching  scientific,'*  says  Wolf,  the  critic  of  Homer, 
"which  is  systematically  laid  out  and  followed  up  to  its 
original  sources.  For  example :  a  knowledge  of  classical  an- 
tiquity is  scientific  when  the  remains  of  classical  antiquity 
are  correctly  studied  in  the  original  languages."  There  can 
be  no  doubt  that  Wolf  is  perfectly  right;  that  all  learning 
is  scientific  which  is  systematically  laid  out  and  followed  up 
to  its  original  sources,  and  that  a  genuine  humanism  is 
scientific. 

When  I  speak  of  knowing  Greek  and  Roman  antiquity, 
therefore,  as  a  help  to  knowing  ourselves  and  the  world, 
I  mean  more  than  a  knowledge  of  so  much  vocabulary,  so 
mlich  grammar,  so  many  portions  of  authors  in  the  Greek 
and  Latin  languages,  I  mean  knowing  the  Greeks  and  Romans, 
and  their  life  and  genius,  and  what  they  were  and  did  in 
the  world;  what  we  get  from  them,  and  what  is  its  value. 
That,  at  least,  is  the  ideal ;  and  when  we  talk  of  endeavouring 
to  know  Greek  and  Roman  antiquity,  as  a  help  to  knowing 
ourselves  and  the  world,  we  mean  endeavouring  so  to  know 
them  as  to  satisfy  this  ideal,  however  much  we  may  still 
fall  short  of  it." 

»* " DiacourwB  in  America,"  pp.  87-89. 


208  EDUCATION 

But  while  our  author  thus  commends  Latin  and 
Greek,  he  is  not  at  all  blind  or  dumb  to  the  value 
of  other  forms  of  training.  He  recognizes  that 
there  is  a  growing  disbelief  in  Latin  and  Greek  and 
a  growing  belief  in  the  modern  languages  and  the 
sciences  as  disciplines.  Asked  to  give  counsel  re- 
garding the  education  of  a  relative,  he  says  in  a 
paragraph  which  may  be  quoted  in  full : 

If  it  is  perception  you  want  to  cultivate  in  Florence  you 
had  much  better  take  some  science  (botany  is  perhaps  the  best 
for  a  girl,  and  I  know  Tyndall  thinks  it  the  best  of  all  for 
educational  purposes),  and  choosing  a  good  handbook,  go 
regularly  through  it  with  her.  Handbooks  have  long  been  the 
great  want  for  teaching  the  natural  sciences,  but  this  want 
is  at  last  beginning  to  be  supplied,  and  for  botany  a  text- 
book based  on  Henslow's  ''Lectures,"  which  were  excellent, 
has  recently  been  published  by  Macmillan.  I  cannot  see 
that  there  is  much  got  out  of  learning  the  Latin  Grammar 
except  the  mainly  normal  discipline  of  learning  something 
much  more  exactly  than  one  is  made  to  learn  anything  else ; 
and  the  verification  of  the  laws  of  grammar,  in  the  examples 
furnished  by  one's  reading,  is  certainly  a  far  less  fruitful 
stimulus  of  one's  powers  of  observation  and  comparison  than 
the  verification  of  the  laws  of  a  science  like  botany  in  the 
examples  furnished  by  the  world  of  nature  before  one's  eyes. 
The  sciences  have  been  abominably  taught,  and  by  untrained 
people,  but  the  moment  properly  trained  people  begin  to 
teach  them  properly  they  fill  such  a  want  in  education  as 
that  which  you  feel  in  Florence's  better  than  either  gram- 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD    209 

mar  or  mathematics,  which  have  been  forced  into  the  service 
because  they  have  been  hitherto  so  far  better  studied  and 
known.  Grammar  and  pure  mathematics  will  fill  a  much 
less  important  part  in  the  education  of  the  young  than 
formerly,  though  the  knowledge  of  the  ancient  world  will 
continue  to  form  a  most  important  part  in  the  education 
of  mankind  generally.  But  the  way  grammar  is  studied  at 
present  is  an  obstacle  to  this  knowledge  rather  than  a  help  to 
it,  and  I  should  be  glad  to  see  it  limited  to  learning  thor- 
oughly the  example-forms  of  words,  and  very  little  more — for 
beginners,  I  mean.  Those  who  have  a  taste  for  philosophi- 
cal studies  may  push  them  further,  and  with  far  more  intel- 
ligible aids  than  our  elementary  grammars  afterwards.  So 
I  should  inflict  on  Florence  neither  Latin  nor  English  gram- 
mar as  an  elaborate  discipline;  make  her  learn  her  French 
verbs  very  thoroughly,  and  do  her  French  exercises  very 
correctly;  but  do  not  go  to  grammar  to  cultivate  in  her 
the  power  you  mass,  but  rather  to  science.^* 

In  respect  to  the  content  of  education  Mr.  Arnold 
again  and  again  refers  to  the  worth  of  the  Bible. 
He  believes  in  the  educative  value  of  the  English 
Bible.   In  *  *  A  Bible  Reading  for  Schools, ' '  he  says : 

Only  one  literature  there  is,  one  great  literature,  for  which 
the  people  have  had  a  preparation — the  literature  of  the 
Bible.  However  far  they  may  be  from  having  a  complete 
preparation  for  it,  they  have  some;  and  it  is  the  only  great 
literature  for  which  they  have  any.  Their  bringing  up,  what 
they  have  heard  and  talked  of  ever  since  they  were  bom, 
have  given  them  no  sort  of  conversance  with  the  forms,  fash- 

»*" Letters,"  Vol.  I.,  p.  364. 


210  EDUCATION 

ions,  notions,  wordings,  allusions,  of  literature  having  its 
source  in  Greece  and  Rome ;  but  they  have  given  them  a  good 
deal  of  conversance  with  the  forms,  fashions,  notions,  word- 
ings, allusions,  of  the  Bible.  Zion  and  Babylon  are  their 
Athens  and  Rome,  their  Ida  and  Olympus  are  Tabor  and 
Hermon,  Sharon  is  their  Tempe;  these  and  the  like  Bible 
names  can  reach  their  imagination,  kindle  trains  of  thought 
and  remembrance  in  them.  The  elements  with  which  the 
literature  of  Greece  and  Rome  conjures,  have  no  power  on 
them;  the  elements  with  which  the  literature  of  the  Bible 
conjures,  have.  Therefore  I  have  so  often  insisted,  in  re- 
ports to  the  Education  Department,  on  the  need,  if  from 
this  point  of  view  only,  for  the  Bible  in  schools  for  the 
people.  If  poetry,  philosophy,  and  eloquence,  if  what  we 
call  in  one  word  letters,  are  a  power,  and  a  beneficent  won- 
der-working power,  in  education,  through  the  Bible  only 
have  the  people  much  chance  of  getting  at  poetry,  philosophy, 
and  eloquence.  Perhaps  I  may  here  quote  what  I  have 
at  former  times  said :  *  *  Chords  of  power  are  touched  by  this 
instruction  which  no  other  part  of  the  instruction  in  a 
popular  school  reaches,  and  chords  various,  not  the  single 
religious  chord  only.  The  Bible  is  for  the  child  in  an  ele- 
mentary school  almost  his  only  contact  with  poetry  and  philos- 
ophy. What  a  course  of  eloquence  and  poetry  (to  call  it  by 
that  name  alone)  is  the  Bible  in  a  school  which  has  and  can 
have  but  little  eloquence  and  poetry!  and  how  much  do 
our  elementary  schools  lose  by  not  having  any  such  source 
as  part  of  their  school-programme.  All  who  value  the  Bible 
may  rest  assured  that  thus  to  know  and  possess  the  Bible  is 
the  most  certain  way  to  extend  the  power  and  elBficacy  of 
the  Bible."" 

"*'A  Bible  Beading  for  Schools,"  pp.  x-xi. 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD    211 

To  the  methods  of  education,  Mr.  Arnold  gives 
much  heed,  and  in  diverse  forms  and  ways,  al- 
though not  with  the  fullness  and  exactness  which 
he  devotes  to  the  content  of  education.  He  is 
not  a  believer  in  the  special  value  of  rules  or  of 
methods.  He  did  not  himself  use  rules.  A  great 
man,  his  personality  was  his  chief  force.  His  ap- 
preciation of  the  worth  of  rules  in  comparison  to 
personality  may  be  inferred  from  what  he  says  of 
the  normal  school  at  Haarlem : 

The  normal  school  at  Haarlem  beeamfi  justly  celebrated 
for  its  success,  due  to  the  capacity  and  character  of  its  di- 
rector, M.  Prinsen.  M.  Prinsen  was  still  at  its  head  when 
M.  Cousin  visited  Holland.  He  received  M.  Cousin  at  Haar- 
lem; and  the  vigour  of  the  man,  and  the  personal  nature  of 
his  influence  over  his  pupils,  is  sufficiently  revealed  in  his 
reply  to  M.  Cousin's  request  for  a  copy  of  the  regulations  of 
his  school:  "I  am  the  regulations,"  was  M.  Prinsen 's  an- 
swer." 

The  same  lesson  is  taught  in  his  summary  of 
Wolf's  great  rule  for  teaching: 

Wolf's  great  rule  in  all  these  lessons  was  that  rule  which 
all  masters  in  the  art  of  teaching  have  followed — to  take  as 
little  part  as  possible  in  the  lesson  himself;  merely  to  start 

""The  Popular  Education  of  France,  with  Notices  of  that  of  Hol- 
land and  Switzerland,"  p.  206. 


212  EDUCATION 

it,  guide  it,  and  sum  it  up,  and  to  let  quite  the  main  part 
in  it  be  borne  by  the  learners.^^ 

It  is  in  a  word  Mr.  Arnold's  belief  that  the 
teacher  is  the  school,  and  that  the  teacher's  own 
personality  will  make  or  impress  the  wisest  meth- 
ods for  securing  the  highest  results. 

Although  Mr.  Arnold  does  not  believe  in  methods 
as  applied  to  the  school-room,  he  does  believe  in  an 
administration  of  education  that  shall  be  orderly, 
logical,  consistent. 

It  is  not  from  any  love  of  bureaucracy  that  men  like  Wil- 
helm  von  Humboldt,  ardent  friends  of  human  dignity  and 
liberty,  have  had  recourse  to  a  department  of  State  in  or- 
ganizing universities;  it  is  because  an  Education  Minister 
supplies  you,  for  the  discharge  of  certain  critical  functions, 
the  agent  who  will  perform  them  in  the  greatest  blaze  of 
daylight  and  with  the  keenest  sense  of  responsibility.  Con- 
vocation made  me  formerly  a  professor,  and  I  am  very  grate- 
ful to  Convocation ;  but  Convocation  is  not  a  fit  body  to  have 
the  appointment  of  professors.  It  is  far  too  numerous,  and 
the  sense  of  responsibility  does  not  tell  upon  it  strongly 
enough.  A  board  is  not  a  fit  body  to  have  the  appointment 
of  professors;  men  will  connive  at  a  job  as  members  of  a 
board  who  single-handed  would  never  have  perpetrated  it. 
Even  the  Crown — that  is,  the  Prime  Minister — is  not  the 
fit  power  to  have  the  appointment  of  professors;  for  the 
Prime  Minister  is  above  all  a  political  functionary,  and  feels 

" ' '  Higher  Schools  and  Universities  in  Germany, ' '  p.  73. 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD    213 

political  influences  overwhelmingly.  An  Education  Minis- 
ter, directly  representing  all  the  interests  of  learning  and 
intelligence  in  this  great  country,  a  full  mark  for  their 
criticism  and  conscious  of  his  responsibility  to  them,  that  is 
the  power  to  whom  to  give  the  appointment  of  professors,  not 
for  his  own  sake,  but  for  the  sake  of  public  education." 

He  believes  in  fact  that  organization  is  the 
method  for  securing  superiority  in  the  teaching 
staff: 

The  instruction  is  better  in  the  foreign  popular  schools  than 
in  ours,  because  the  teachers  are  better  trained,  and  of  the 
training  of  teachers  I  shall  have  to  speak  presently.  This  is 
the  main  reason  of  the  superiority,  that  the  teachers  are  bet- 
ter trained.  But  that  they  are  better  trained  comes  from 
a  cause  which  acts  for  good  upon  the  whole  of  education 
abroad,  that  the  instruction  as  a  whole  is  better  organized 
than  with  us.  Indeed,  with  us  it  is  not,  and  cannot  at  pres- 
ent be  organized  as  a  whole  at  all,  for  the  public  adminis- 
tration, which  deals  with  the  popular  schools,  stops  at  those 
schools,  and  takes  into  its  view  no  others.  But  there  is  an 
article  in  the  constitution  of  Canton  Zurich  which  well  ex- 
presses the  idea  which  prevails  everywhere  abroad  of  the 
organization  of  instruction  from  top  to  bottom  as  one  whole : 
Die  hohem  Lehranstalten  sollen  mit  der  Volkschule  in  organ- 
ische  Verhindung  gehracht  werden;  the  higher  establish- 
ments for  teaching  shall  be  brought  into  organic  connexion 
with  the  popular  school.  And  men  like  Wilhelm  von  Hum- 
boldt in  Germany  and  Guizot  or  Cousin  in  France  have  been 
at  the  head  of  the  public  administration  of  schools  la  those 

^Ibid.,  pp.  222-223. 


214  EDUCATION 

countries,  and  have  organized  popular  instruction  as  a  part 
of  one  great  system,  a  part  in  correspondence  of  some  kind 
with  the  higher  parts,  and  to  be  organized  with  the  same 
seriousness,  the  same  thorough  knowledge  and  large  views 
of  education,  the  same  single  eye  to  its  requirements,  as 
the  higher  parts. 

We  may  imagine  the  like  in  England  if  we  suppose  a 
man  like  Sir  James  Mackintosh  at  the  head  of  the  Education 
Department  having  to  administer  the  public  school  system 
for  intermediate  and  higher  education  as  well  as  the  popular 
schools,  in  continual  intercourse  with  the  representatives 
of  that  system  as  well  as  with  representatives  of  the  popular 
schools,  and  treating  questions  respecting  popular  instruc- 
tion with  a  mind  apt  for  all  educational  questions  and  con- 
versant with  them,  aided,  moreover,  by  the  intercourse  just 
spoken  of.  Evidently  questions  respecting  codes  and  pro- 
grams would  then  present  themselves  under  conditions  very 
different  from  the  present  conditions.  The  popular  school 
in  our  country  is  at  present  considered  by  the  minister  in 
charge  of  it  not  at  all  as  one  stage  to  be  co-ordered  with  the 
other  stages  in  a  great  system  of  public  schools,  and  to  have 
its  course  surveyed  and  fixed  from  the  point  of  view  of  a 
knower  and  lover  of  education.  Not  at  all;  the  popular 
school  is  necessarily,  for  him,  not  so  much  an  educational 
problem  as  a  social  and  political  one;  as  a  school  dealing 
with  a  few  elementary  matters,  simple  enough,  and  the 
great  thing  is  to  make  the  House  of  Commons  and  the  pub- 
lic mind  satisfied  that  value  is  received  for  the  public  money 
spent  on  teaching  these  matters.  Hence  the  Code  which 
governs  the  instruction  in  our  popular  schools.  And  I  have 
always  felt  that  objections  made  in  the  pure  interest  of  good 
instruction  and  education  to  the  Code  had  this  disadvantage, 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD    215 

that  they  came  before  a  man,  often  very  able,  but  who,  from 
his  circumstances,  would  not  and  could  not  consider  them 
from  the  point  of  a  disinterested  knower  and  friend  of  edu- 
cation at  all,  but  from  a  point  of  view  quite  different.*' 

The  contrast  between  Mr.  Arnold's  lack  of  belief 
in  methods  in  the  school-room  and  his  outstanding 
belief  in  method  as  applied  to  administration — and 
in  an  administrative  organization,  beginning  with 
a  minister  of  education,  who  is  a  monarch,  and  run- 
ning down  through  a  Prussian  system  of  subordi- 
nate officers — is  striking  and  impressive. 

Mr.  Arnold  recognizes  that  the  teacher  is,  under 
a  good  system  of  administration,  the  chief  or  the 
only  force.  In  respect  to  the  training  of  teachers, 
he  says  : 

They  say,  why  demand  so  much  learning  from  those  who 
will  have  to  impart  so  little? — why  impose  on  those  who 
will  have  to  teach  the-  rudiments  only  of  knowledge  to  the 
children  of  the  poor,  an  examination  so  wide  in  its  range, 
so  searching  in  its  details? 

The  answer  to  this  involves  the  whole  question  as  to  the 
training  of  the  teachers  of  elementary  schools.  It  is  suffi- 
cient to  say,  that  the  plan  which  these  objectors  recommend, 
the  plan  of  employing  teachers  whose  attainments  do  not  rise 
far  above  the  level  of  the  attainments  of  their  scholars,  has 
already  been  tried.    It  has  been  tried,  and  it  has  failed.    Its 

""Special  Report  on  Elementary  Education  in  Germany,  Switzer- 
land, and  Trance,  1886,"  p.  15. 


216  EDUCATION 

fruits  were  to  be  seen  in  the  condition  of  elementary  educa- 
tion throughout  England,  until  a  very  recent  period.  It  is 
now  sufficiently  clear,  that  the  teacher  to  whom  you  give 
only  a  drudge's  training,  will  do  only  a  drudge's  work,  and 
will  do  it  in  a  drudge's  spirit:  that  in  order  to  ensure  good 
instruction  even  within  narrow  limits  in  a  school,  you  must 
provide  it  with  a  master  far  superior  to  his  scholars,  with 
a  master  whose  own  attainments  reach  beyond  the  limits 
within  which  those  of  his  scholars  may  be  bounded.  To  form 
a  good  teacher  for  the  simplest  elementary  school,  a  period 
of  regular  training  is  requisite:  this  period  must  he  filled 
with  work.  .  .  .^° 

For  that  outstanding  element  in  English  educa- 
tion, the  examination,  Mr.  Arnold  has  a  just  con- 
demnation. Especially  does  he  condemn  examina- 
tions conducted  for  men  who  have  been  preparing 
for  them  by  cramming : 

Examinations  preceded  by  preparation  in  a  first-rate  su- 
perior school,  with  first-rate  professors,  give  you  a  formed 
man;  examinations  preceded  by  preparation  under  a  cram- 
nuer  give  you  a  crammed  man,  but  not  a  formed  one.  I  once 
bore  part  in  the  examinations  for  the  Indian  Civil  Service, 
and  I  can  truly  say  that  the  candidates  to  whom  I  gave 
the  highest  marks  were  almost  without  exception  the  can- 
didates whom  I  would  not  have  appointed.  They  were 
crammed  men,  not  formed  men;  the  formed  men  were  the 
public  school  men,  but  they  were  ignorant  on  the  special 
matter  of  examination, — English  literature.  A  superior  school 

*"  Reports  on  Elementary  Schools,  1855,"  p.  55. 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD    217 

forms  a  man  at  the  same  time  that  it  gives  him  special 
knowledge.*^ 

Mr.  Arnold  says  in  testing  this  type  of  training : 

Attention  has  lately  been  called  to  the  breakdown,  in  India, 
of  a  number  of  young  in/en  who  had  won  their  appointments 
after  severe  study  and  severe  examination.  No  doubt  the 
quantity  of  mental  exertion  required  for  examinations  is  often 
excessive,  but  the  strain  is  much  the  more  severe,  because 
the  quality  and  character  of  mental  exertion  required  are  so 
often  injudicious.  The  mind  is  less  strained  the  more  it 
reacts  on  what  it  deals  with,  and  has  a  native  play  of  its 
own,  and  is  creative.  It  is  more  strained  the  more  it  has  to 
receive  a  number  of  "knowledges"  passively,  and  to  store 
them  up  to  be  reproduced  in  an  examination.  But  to  ac- 
quire a  number  of  "knowledges,"  store  them,  and  reproduce 
them,  was  what  in  general  those  candidates  for  Indian  em- 
ployment had  had  to  do.  By  their  success  in  doing  this  they 
were  tested,  and  the  examination  turned  on  it.  In  old  days 
examinations  mainly  turned  upon  Latin  and  Greek  composi- 
tion. Composition  in  the  dead  languages  is  now  wholly  out 
of  favor,  and  I  by  no  means  say  that  it  is  a  sufficient  test 
for  candidates  for  Indian  employment.  But  I  will  say  that 
the  character  and  quality  of  mental  exertion  required  for  it 
is  more  healthy  than  the  character  and  quality  of  exertion 
required  for  receiving  and  storing  a  number  of  "knowl- 
edges."" 

In  a  brief  and  comprehensive  word,  it  is  to  be 
said  that  Mr.  Arnold  believes  the  great  benefit  of 

""A  French  Eton,"  p.  412. 

""Reports  on  Elementary  Schools,  1882,"  p.  256. 


218  EDUCATION 

education  lies  in  the  elevation  of  the  mind  and  feel- 
ings. This  is  ^Hhe  unspeakable  benefit."  He  be- 
lieves that  the  humanizing  touch  is  the  greatest 
and  most  precious  worth.  This  worth  is  especially 
emphasized  in  the  schools  of  Germany.  There  he 
finds  *Hhe  children  human."    He  says  in  detail: 

They  had  heen  brought  under  teaching  of  a  quality  to 
touch  and  interest  them,  and  were  being  formed  by  it.  The 
fault  of  the  teaching  in  our  popular  schools  at  home  is,  as  I 
have  often  said,  that  it  is  so  little  formative;  it  gives  the 
children  the  power  to  read  the  newspapers,  to  write  a 
letter,  to  cast  accounts,  and  gives  them  a  certain  number  of 
pieces  of  knowledge,  but  it  does  little  to  touch  their  nature 
for  good  and  to  mould  them.  You  hear  often  people  of  the 
richer  class  in  England  wishing  that  they  and  their  children 
were  as  well  educated  as  the  children  of  an  elementary  school ; 
they  mean  that  they  wish  they  wrote  as  good  a  hand,  worked 
sums  as  rapidly  and  correctly,  and  had  as  many  facts  of 
geography  at  command ;  but  they  suppose  themselves  retain- 
ing all  the  while  the  fuller  cultivation  of  taste  and  feeling 
which  is  their  advantage  and  their  children's  advantage 
over  the  pupils  of  the  elementary  school  at  present,  and  they 
forget  that  it  is  within  the  power  of  the  popular  school,  and 
should  be  its  aim,  to  do  much  for  this  cultivation,  although 
our  schools  accomplish  for  it  so  very  little.  The  excellent 
maxim  of  that  true  friend  of  education,  the  German  school- 
master, John  Comenius,  "The  aim  is  to  train  generally  all 
who  are  born  to  all  which  is  human,"  does  in  some  consid- 
erable degree  govern  the  proceedings  of  popular  schools  in 


ACCORDING  TO  MATTHEW  ARNOLD    219 

German  countries,  and  now  in  France  also,  but  in  England 
hardly  at  all." 

He  says  comprehensively : 

The  aim  and  office  of  instruction,  say  many  people,  is  to 
make  a  man  a  good  citizen,  or  a  good  Christian,  or  a  gentle- 
man; or  it  is  to  fit  hira  to  get  on  in  the  world,  or  it  is  to 
enable  him  to  do  his  duty  in  that  state  of  life  to  which  he 
is  called.  It  is  none  of  these,  and  the  modern  spirit  more 
and  more  discerns  it  to  be  none  of  these.  These  are  at  best 
secondary  and  indirect  aims  of  instruction;  its  prime  direct 
aim  is  to  enable  a  man  to  know  himself  and  the  world.'* 

And  he  adds  in  conclusion : 

As  our  public  instruction  gets  a  clearer  view  of  its  own 
functions,  of  the  relations  of  the  human  spirit  to  knowledge, 
and  of  the  entire  circle  of  knowledge,  it  will  certainly  more 
learn  to  awaken  in  its  pupils  an  interest  in  that  entire  circle, 
and  less  allow  them  to  remain  total  strangers  to  any  part 
of  it.  Still,  the  circle  is  so  vast  and  human  faculties  are 
so  limited,  that  it  is  for  the  most  part  through  a  single  apti- 
tude, or  group  of  aptitudes,  that  each  individual  will  really 
get  his  access  to  intellectual  life  and  vital  knowledge;  and 
it  is  by  effectually  directing  these  aptitudes  on  definite  points 
of  the  circle,  that  he  will  really  obtain  his  comprehension  of 
the  whole." 

""Special  Eeport  on  Elementary  Education  in  Germany,  Switzer- 
land, and  France,  1886,"  p.  14. 

•*" Higher  Schools  and  Universities  in  Germany,"  p.  154. 
"Ibid.,  p.  157. 


220  EDUCATION 

As  I  write  the  closing  paragraph  of  this  chapter, 
I  find  hanging  before  me  a  picture  of  Matthew 
Arnold.  It  is  a  strong,  calm,  serious,  solemn  face, 
touched  with  semi-melancholy.  It  is  as  if  the  effort 
to  see  life  sanely  and  to  see  it  whole  were  too  heavy, 
or  as  if,  having  seen  life,  the  inevitable  result  were 
depression  of  soul.  Yet  the  face  thus  set  forth  is 
not  quite  a  true  exponent  of  the  man.  For  Mat- 
thew Arnold  had  much  of  the  Greek's  joyousness  in 
life,  much  of  the  French  lucidity  and  delicacy  of 
taste,  much  of  the  Englishman's  solidity  and  pa- 
tience. A  critic  of  life,  he  sought  through  his  criti- 
cisms to  minister  to  his  nation's  well-being.  An 
interpreter  of  religion,  he  endeavored  to  make  the 
Christian  faith  more  rational  without  causing  it 
to  lose  its  spirit  of  devotion.  A  poet,  his  verses 
are,  though  carefully  wrought  in  his  own  tongue, 
bathed  in  the  Attic  dew.  An  inspector  of  schools, 
he  tried  to  make  education  of  every  sort  a  more 
efficient  instrument  of  genuine  culture  and  of  noble 
joyousness.  If  his  father  was  the  most  outstanding 
school  master  of  the  early  years  of  the  Victorian 
period,  he  himself  was  in  its  later  decades  an  ex- 
positor of  commanding  comprehensiveness,  of  defi- 
nite criticism,  of  charming  persuasiveness  and  of 
quickening  enthusiasms. 


VII 

EDUCATION  ACCORDING  TO  JOHN   HENRY  NEWMAN 

T  N  an  inconspicuous  private  library  hang  photo- 
-^  graphs  of  two  great  portraits.  One  shows  a 
man  of  twenty-five,  having  a  face  regular  in  out- 
line, full  and  fair,  content  without  self-satisfac- 
tion, with  eyes  direct  and  alert,  with  hair,  regularly 
laid,  brushed  back  from  a  high  intellectual  fore- 
head, with  lips  set  firmly  and  yet  without  any  sus- 
picion of  obstinacy,  with  chin  strong,  yet  free  from 
any  imdue  assertiveness,  with  head  resting  well 
poised  on  a  neck  straight  and  strong,  and  over  all  a 
radiant  atmosphere  of  hopefulness,  of  sunshine,  of 
force,  of  poise,  and  of  elevation.  In  the  other  por- 
trait is  seen  an  old  man  of  four  score  years,  with 
face  thin  and  worn,  the  cheeks  fallen  in,  the  eyes, 
sunken  back  into  their  sockets,  patiently  looking 
out  into  some  indefinite  unkno"wn,  locks  of  hair  few, 
irregular,  scattered,  the  chin  receding  and  the  chest 
retreating,  and  over  all  a  dark,  dull  atmosphere  of 
depression,  dejection  and  disappointment,  **dull, 
monotonous,  unprofitable,  hopeless,"  though  the 

221 


222  EDUCATION 

robe  of  a  cardinal  rests  on  the  narrow  and  thin 
shoulders  and  though  the  ring  of  a  cardinal  is  on 
the  hand  which  grasps  the  crosier  which  seems 
rather  the  crutch  of  support  than  a  symbol  of  au- 
thority or  of  power.  The  one  picture  recalls  the 
portrait  of  Titian's  ^' Young  Nobleman,"  yet  hav- 
ing an  intellectual  and  moral  virility  of  which  the 
nobleman  never  dreamed.  The  other  recalls  the 
portrait  of  Voltaire,  the  aged,  without  the  in- 
tellectual activity,  acquisitiveness  and  alertness, 
which  the  great  Frenchman  possessed. 

Between  the  time  of  these  two  portraits — for 
they  each  bear  the  one  name  of  John  Henry  New- 
man— ^lies  a  life  of  high  distinction,  of  manifold 
and  diverse  achievements,  which  is  still  one  of  the 
enigmas  of  biographic  interpretation. 

Yet,  interpretations,  moving  and  keen,  have  been 
essayed,  and  their  diversity  illustrates  the  enig- 
matic quality  of  this  outstanding  life  and  career. 
To  some,  Newman  is  a  religious  philosopher  like 
Pascal,  to  others,  a  mystic  like  Fenelon.  To  one, 
like  Lord  Morley,  he  is  simply  a  master  of  English 
style  and  not  to  be  considered  as  a  thinker.  To 
some,  like  certain  German  critics,  he  is  an  ecclesi- 
astic and  theologian,  a  writer  concerned  with  the- 
ory and  development  in  dogma ;  and  to  others,  like 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    223 

Dean  Stanley,  he  belongs  to  the  literature  of  all 
time.  He  himself  illustrates  what  his  biographer 
has  said: 

That  the  same  object  may  be  seen  by  different  onlookers 
under  aspects  so  various  and  partial  as  to  make  their  views, 
from  their  inadequacy,  appear  occasionally  even  contradic- 
tory.* 

Yet  in  a  still  different  light  lies  our  task,  of  in- 
terpreting Newman  as  an  educationist.  For,  in  a 
word,  what  is  education  according  to  John  Henry 
Newman  ? 

The  answer  to  this  fundamental  question  can  be 
made  for  him  by  seeking  out  his  interpretation  of 
the  human  reason,  its  nature,  character,  possibili- 
ties and  limitations. 

In  one  of  his  great  sermons — sermons  which 
have  the  lyric  element  as  a  superlative  excellence — 
he  says: 

Reason  is  that  faculty  of  the  mind  by  which  knowledge  of 
things  external  to  us,  of  beings,  facts  and  events,  is  attained 
beyond  the  range  of  sense.  It  ascertains  for  us  not  natural 
things  only,  or  immaterial  only,  or  present  only,  or  past,  or 
future;  but,  even  if  limited  in  its  power,  it  is  unlimited  in 
its  range,  viewed  as  a  faculty,  though,  of  course,  in  individu- 
als it  varies  in  range  also.    It  reaches  to  the  ends  of  the  uni- 

*"The  Life  of  John  Henry  Cardinal  Newman,"  by  Wilfrid  Ward, 
Vol.  I.,  p.  2. 


224  EDUCATION 

verse,  and  to  the  throne  of  God  beyond  them;  it  brings  us 
knowledge,  whether  clear  or  uncertain,  still  knowledge,  in 
whatever  degree  of  perfection,  from  every  side;  but,  at  the 
same  time,  with  this  characteristic,  that  it  obtains  it  indirectly, 
not  directly. 

Reason  does  not  really  perceive  any  thing;  but  it  is  a  fac- 
ulty of  proceeding  from  things  that  are  perceived  to  things 
which  are  not;  the  existence  of  which  it  certifies  to  us  on  the 
hypothesis  of  something  else  being  known  to  exist,  in  other 
words,  being  assumed  to  be  true.  .  .  . 

Reason  is  the  faculty  of  gaining  knowledge  without  direct 
perception,  or  of  ascertaining  one  thing  by  means  of  another. 
In  this  way  it  is  able,  from  small  beginnings,  to  create  to 
itself  a  world  of  ideas,  which  do  or  do  not  correspond  to  the 
things  themselves  for  which  they  stand,  or  are  true  or  not, 
according  as  it  is  exercised  soundly  or  otherwise.  One  fact 
may  sufi&ce  for  a  whole  theory;  one  principle  may  create 
and  sustain  a  system;  one  minute  token  is  a  clue  to  a  large 
discovery.  The  mind  ranges  to  and  fro,  and  spreads  out, 
and  advances  forward  with  a  quickness  which  has  become 
a  proverb,  and  a  subtlety  and  versatility  which  baffle  inves- 
tigation. It  passes  on  fromj  point  to  point,  gaining  one  by 
some  indication;  another  on  a  probability;  then  availing  it- 
self of  an  association;  then  falling  back  on  some  received 
law;  next  seizing  on  testimony;  then  committing  itself  to 
some  popular  impression,  or  some  inward  instinct,  or  some 
obscure  memory;  and  thus  it  makes  progress  not  unlike  a 
clamberer  on  a  steep  cliff,  who,  by  quick  eye,  prompt  hand, 
and  firm  foot,  ascends  how  he  knows  not  himself,  by  per- 
sonal endowments  and  by  practice,  rather  than  by  rule, 
leaving  no  track  behind  him,  and  unable  to  teach  another. 
It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  the  stepping  by  which  great 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    225 

^niuses  scale  the  mountains  of  truth  is  as  unsafe  and  pre- 
carious to  men  in  general,  as  the  ascent  of  a  skilful  moun- 
taineer up  a  literal  crag.  It  is  a  way  which  they  alone  can 
take;  and  its  justification  lies  in  their  success.  And  such 
mainly  is  the  way  in  which  all  men,  gifted  or  not  gifted,  com- 
monly reason, — not  by  rule,  but  by  an  inward  faculty.* 

In  another  sermon,  he,  with  great  significance, 
interprets  still  further : 

Philosophy  is  Reason  exercised  upon  Knowledge ;  for,  from 
the  nature  of  the  case,  where  the  facts  are  given,  as  is  here 
supposed,  Reason  is  synonymous  with  analysis,  having  no 
oflfice  beyond  that  of  ascertaining  the  relations  existing  be- 
tween them.  Reason  is  the  power  of  proceeding  to  new  ideas 
by  means  of  given  ones.' 

Yet  this  faculty  of  reason  is  to  be  used  in  wis- 
dom, in  faith  and  through  the  gracious  help  of  God 
himself.  The  piety  of  reason  is  voiced  in  this 
prayer: 

O  gracious  and  merciful  God,  Father  of  Lights,  I  humbly 
pray  and  beseech  Thee,  that  in  all  my  exercises  of  Reason, 
Thy  gift,  I  may  use  it,  as  Thou  wouldst  have  me  use  it,  in 
the  obedience  of  Faith,  with  a  view  to  Thy  Glory,  with  an 
aim  at  Thy  Truth,  in  dutiful  submission  to  Thy  Will,  for 
the  comfort  of  Thine  elect,  for  the  edification  of  Holy  Jerusa- 
lem, Thy  Church,  and  in  recollection  of  Thine  own  solemn 
warning:    "Every  idle  word  that  men  shall  speak,  they  shall 

•"Oxford  University  Sermons,"  pp.  206,  256. 
*Ibid.,  p.  290. 


226  EDUCATION 

give  an  account  thereof  in  the  day  of  judgment;  for  by 
thy  words,  thou  shalt  be  justified,  and  by  thy  words,  thou 
shalt  be  condemned. ' '  * 

The  reason  of  man  is  to  be  trained  and  formed ; 
and  this  training  and  discipline  will  manifest  them- 
selves in  certain  unique  intellectual  methods  and 
conditions. 

When  the  intellect  has  once  been  properly  trained  and 
formed  to  have  a  connected  view  or  grasp  of  things,  it  will 
display  its  powers  with  more  or  less  effect  according  to  its 
particular  quality  and  capacity  in  the  individual.  In  the 
case  of  most  men  it  makes  itself  felt  in  the  good  sense,  sobriety 
of  thought,  reasonableness,  candour,  self-command,  and  stead- 
iness of  view,  which  characterize  it.  In  some  it  will  have  de- 
veloped habits  of  business,  power  of  influencing  others,  and 
sagacity.  In  others  it  will  elicit  the  talent  of  philosophical 
speculation,  and  lead  the  mind  forward  to  eminence  in  this 
or  that  intellectual  department.  In  all  it  will  be  a  faculty  of 
entering  with  comparative  ease  into  any  subject  of  thought, 
and  of  taking  up  with  aptitude  any  science  or  profession.' 

The  first  step  in  intellectual  training  is  to  impress  upon 
a  boy's  mind  the  idea  of  science,  method,  order,  principle, 
and  system ;  of  rule  and  exception,  of  richness  and  harmony. 
This  is  commonly  and  excellently  done  by  making  him  be- 
gin with  Grammar;  nor  can  too  great  accuracy,  or  minute- 
ness and  subtlety  of  teaching  be  used  towards  him,  as  his 
faculties  expand,  with  this  simple  purpose.    Hence  it  is  that 

*  Ward's,  "Life  of,"  etc..  Vol.  II.,  pp.  364-365. 
'"The  Idea  of  a  University,"  Preface,  pp.  xvii-xviii. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    227 

critical  scholarship  is  so  important  a  discipline  for  him  when 
he  is  leaving  school  for  the  University.  A  second  science  is 
the  Mathematics:  this  should  follow  Grammar,  still  with 
the  same  object,  viz.,  to  give  him  a  conception  of  develop- 
ment and  arrangement  from  and  around  a  common  centre. 
Hence  it  is  that  Chronology  and  Geography  are  so  necessary 
for  him,  when  he  reads  History,  which  is  otherwise  little  bet- 
ter than  a  story-book.  Hence,  too,  Metrical  Composition,  when 
he  reads  Poetry ;  in  order  to  stimulate  his  powers  into  action 
in  every  practicable  way,  and  to  prevent  a  merely  passive 
reception  of  images  and  ideas  which  in  that  case  are  likely 
to  pass  out  of  the  mind  as  soon  as  they  have  entered  it.  Let 
him  once  gain  this  habit  of  method,  of  starting  from  fixed 
(points,  of  making  his  ground  good  as  he  goes,  of  distinguish- 
ing what  he  knows  from  what  he  does  not  know,  and  I  con- 
ceive he  will  be  gradually  initiated  into  the  largest  and  truest 
philosophical  views,  and  will  feel  nothing  but  impatience  and 
'disgust  at  the  random  theories  and  imposing  sophistries  and 
♦dashing  paradoxes,  which  carry  away  half-formed  and  super- 
ficial intellects." 

The  education  thus  secured  we  denominate  **Hb- 
,eral"  because  it  sets  the  reason  free,  making  it  at 
I  home  in  every  intellectual  zone.  The  man  who  has 
I  such  a  training 

apprehends  the  great  outlines  of  knowledge,  the  principles 
on  which  it  rests,  the  scale  of  its  parts,  its  lights  and  its 
shades,  its  great  points  and  its  little,  as  he  otherwise  cannot 
apprehend  them.  Hence  it  is  that  his  education  is  called 
•  Ibid.,  pp.  xiz-zx. 


228  EDUCATION 

** Liberal."  A  habit  of  mind  is  formed  which  lasts  through 
life,  of  which  the  attributes  are,  freedom,  equitableness,  calm- 
ness, moderation,  and  wisdom/ 

It  is  common  to  speak  of  "liberal  knowledge,"  of  the 
"liberal  arts  and  studies,"  and  of  a  "liberal  education," 
as  the  especial  characteristic  or  property  of  a  University  and 
of  a  gentleman;  what  is  really  meant  by  the  word?  Now, 
first,  in  its  grammatical  sense  it  is  opposed  to  servile;  and 
by  "servile  work"  is  understood,  as  our  catechisms  inform 
us,  bodily  labour,  mechanical  employment,  and  the  like,  in 
which  the  mind  has  little  or  no  part.  Parallel  to  such  servile 
works  are  those  arts,  if  they  deserve  the  name,  of  which  the 
poet  speaks,  which  owe  their  origin  and  their  method  to  haz- 
ard, not  to  skill ;  as,  for  instance,  the  practice  and  operations 
of  an  empiric.  As  far  as  this  contrast  may  be  considered  as 
a  guide  into  the  meaning  of  the  word,  liberal  education  and 
liberal  pursuits  are  exercises  of  mind,  of  reason,  of  reflection. 

But  we  want  something  more  for  its  explanation,  for  there 
are  bodily  exercises  which  are  liberal,  and  mental  exercises 
which  are  not  so.  For  instance,  in  ancient  times  the  practi- 
tioners in  medicine  were  commonly  slaves;  yet  it  was  an  art 
as  intellectual  in  its  nature,  in  spite  of  the  pretence,  fraud, 
and  quackery  with  which  it  might  then,  as  now,  be  debased, 
as  it  was  heavenly  in  its  aim.  And  so  in  like  manner,  we 
contrast  a  liberal  education  with  a  commercial  education 
or  a  professional;  yet  no  one  can  deny  that  commerce  and 
the  professions  afford  scope  for  the  highest  and  most  diversi- 
fied powers  of  mind.  There  is  then  a  great  variety  of  intel- 
lectual exercises,  which  are  not  technically  called  "liberal"; 
on  the  other  hand,  I  say,  there  are  exercises  of  the  body 

'Ihid.,  p.  101. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    229 

which  do  receive  that  appellation.  Such,  for  instance,  was 
the  paliestra,  in  ancient  times;  such  the  Olympic  games,  in 
which  strength  and  dexterity  of  body  as  well  as  of  mind 
gained  the  prize.  In  Xenophon  we  read  of  the  young  Persian 
nobility  being  taught  to  ride  on  horseback  and  to  speak  the 
truth ;  both  being  among  the  accomplishments  of  a  gentleman. 
War,  too,  however  rough  a  profession,  has  ever  been  ac- 
counted liberal,  unless  in  cases  when  it  becomes  heroic,  which 
would  introduce  us  to  another  subject.' 

The  principle  of  real  dignity  in  Knowledge,  its  worth,  its 
desirableness,  considered  irrespectively  of  its  results,  is  this 
germ  within  it  of  a  scientific  or  a  philosophical  process.  This 
is  how  it  comes  to  be  an  end  in  itself;  this  is  why  it  admits 
of  being  called  Liberal.  Not  to  know  the  relative  disposition 
of  things  is  the  state  of  slaves  or  children ;  to  have  mapped 
out  the  Universe  is  the  boast,  or  at  least  the  ambition,  of 
Philosophy 

When,  then,  we  speak  of  the  communication  of  Knowl- 
edge as  being  Education,  we  thereby  really  imply  that  that 
Knowledge  is  a  state  or  condition  of  mind;  and  since  culti- 
vation of  mind  is  surely  worth  seeking  for  its  own  sake,  we 
are  thus  brought  once  more  to  the  conclusion,  which  the 
word  "Liberal"  and  the  word  "Philosophy"  have  already 
suggested,  that  there  is  a  Knowledge,  which  is  desirable, 
though  nothing  comes  of  it,  as  being  of  itself  a  treasure,  and 
a  sufiBcient  remuneration  of  years  of  labour.' 


Such  an  education  has  tremendous  significances 
for  the  individual  man  and  for  the  race : 

*Ihid,,  p.  106. 
•/6id.,  pp.  113,  114. 


230  EDUCATION 

One  main  portion  of  intellectual  education,  of  the  labours 
of  both  school  and  university,  is  to  remove  the  original  dinv 
ness  of  the  mind 's  eye ;  to  strengthen  and  perfect  its  vision ;  to 
enable  it  to  look  out  into  the  world  right  forward,  steadily  and 
truly;  to  give  the  mind  clearness,  accuracy,  precision;  to 
enable  it  to  use  words  aright,  to  understand  what  it  says, 
to  conceive  justly  what  it  thinks  about,  to  abstract,  compare, 
analyze,  divide,  define,  and  reason,  correctly.  There  is  a 
particular  science  which  takes  these  matters  in  hand,  and 
it  is  called  logic ;  but  it  is  not  by  logic,  certainly  not  by  logic 
alone,  that  the  faculty  I  speak  of  is  acquired.  The  infant 
does  not  learn  to  spell  and  read  the  hues  upon  his  retina  by 
any  scientific  rule;  nor  does  the  student  learn  accuracy  of 
thought  by  any  manual  or  treatise.  The  instruction  given 
him,  of  whatever  kind,  if  it  be  really  instruction,  is  mainly, 
or  at  least  pre-eminently,  this, — a  discipline  in  accuracy  of 
mind.i" 

The  reason  of  man,  thus  disciplined,  is  not  sim- 
ply a  thinking  machine:  it  is  far  other  than 
mechanical.    It 

does  manifest  itself  in  a  courtesy,  propriety,  and  polish  of 
word  and  action,  which  is  beautiful  in  itself,  and  acceptable 
to  others;  but  it  does  much  more.  It  brings  the  mind  into 
form, — for  the  mind  is  like  the  body.  Boys  outgrow  their 
shape  and  their  strength ;  their  limbs  have  to  be  knit  together, 
and  their  constitution  needs  tone.  Mistaking  animal  spirits 
for  vigour,  and  overconfident  in  their  health,  ignorant  what 
they  can  bear  and  how  to  manage  themselves,  they  are  immod- 
erate and  extravagant ;  and  fall  into  sharp  sicknesses.  This  is 
"Ibid.,  p.  332. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    231 

an  emblem  of  their  minds;  at  first  they  have  no  principles 
laid  down  within  them  as  a  foundation  for  the  intellect  to 
build  upon;  they  have  no  discriminating  convictions,  and 
no  grasp  of  consequences." 

But  perhaps  the  most  comprehensive  result  of  a 
liberal  education  lies  in  the  enlargement  of  the 
mind  of  man.  In  sermon  as  well  as  in  essay  New- 
man refers  to  this  precious  consequence. 

However,  a  very  little  consideration  will  make  it  plain  also, 
that  knowledge  itself,  though  a  Condition  of  the  mind's  en- 
largement, yet,  whatever  be  its  range,  is  not  that  very  thing 
which  enlarges  it.  Rather  the  foregoing  instances  show  that 
this  enlargement  consists  in  the  comparison  of  the  subjects 
of  knowledge  one  with  another.  We  feel  ourselves  to  be 
ranging  freely,  when  we  not  only  learn  something,  but  when 
we  also  refer  it  to  what  we  knew  before.  It  is  not  the  mere 
addition  to  our  knowledge  which  is  the  enlargement,  but  the 
change  of  place,  the  movement  onwards,  of  that  moral  centre, 
to  which  what  we  know  and  what  we  have  been  acquiring, 
the  whole  mass  of  our  knowledge,  as  it  were,  gravitates.  And 
therefore  a  philosophical  cast  of  thought,  or  a  comprehensive 
nynd,  or  wisdom  in  conduct  or  policy,  implies  a  connected 
view  of  the  old  with  the  new;  an  insight  into  the  bearing 
and  influence  of  each  part  upon  every  other;  without  which 
there  is  no  whole,  and  could  be  no  centre.  It  is  the  knowl- 
edge, not  only  of  things,  but  of  their  mutual  relations.  It  is 
organized,  and  therefore  living  knowledge.^* 

"  Ibid.,  Preface,  p.  rvi. 

""Oxford  University  Sermons,"  p.  287. 


2a2  EDUCATION 

Narrow  minds  have  no  power  of  throwing  themselves  into 
the  minds  of  others.  They  have  stiffened  in  one  position,  as 
limbs  of  the  body  subjected  to  confinement,  or  as  our  organs 
of  speech,  which  after  a  while  cannot  learn  new  tones  and 
inflections.  They  have  already  parcelled  out  to  their  own 
satisfaction  the  whole  world  of  knowledge ;  they  have  drawn 
their  lines,  and  formed  their  classes,  and  given  to  each  opin- 
ion, argument,  principle,  and  party,  its  own  locality;  they 
profess  to  know  where  to  find  every  thing;  and  they  cannot 
learn  any  other  disposition.  They  are  vexed  at  new  prin- 
ciples of  arrangement,  and  grow  giddy  amid  cross  divisions; 
and,  even  if  they  make  the  effort,  cannot  master  them.  They 
think  that  any  one  truth  excludes  another  which  is  distinct 
from  it,  and  that  every  opinion  is  contrary  to  their  own 
opinions  which  is  not  included  in  them.  They  cannot  sepa- 
rate words  from  their  own  ideas,  and  ideas  from  their  own 
associations;  and  if  they  attain  any  new  view  of  a  subject, 
it  is  but  for  a  moment.  They  catch  it  one  moment,  and  let 
it  go  the  next ;  and  then  impute  to  subtlety  in  it,  or  obscurity 
in  its  expression,  what  really  arises  from  their  own  want  of 
elasticity  or  vigour.  And  when  they  attempt  to  describe  it  in 
their  own  language,  their  nearest  approximation  to  it  is  a 
mistake ;  not  from  any  purpose  to  be  unjust,  but  because  they 
are  expressing  the  ideas  of  another  mind,  as  it  were,  in 
translation.^^ 

The  enlargement  consists,  not  merely  in  the  passive  recep- 
tion into  the  mind  of  a  number  of  ideas  hitherto  unknown 
to  it,  but  in  the  mind 's  energetic  and  simultaneous  action  upon 
and  towards  and  among  those  new  ideas,  which  are  rushing 
in  upon  it.  It  is  the  action  of  a  formative  power,  reducing 
to  order  and  meaning  the  matter  of  our  acquirements;  it  is 

"Ibid.,  pp.  307-308. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    233 

a  making  the  objects  of  our  knowledge  subjectively  our  own, 
or,  to  use  a  familiar  word,  it  is  a  digestion  of  what  we  re- 
ceive, into  the  substance  of  our  previous  state  of  thought; 
and  without  this  no  enlargement  is  said  to  follow.  There  is 
no  enlargement,  unless  there  be  a  comparison  of  ideas  one 
with  another,  as  they  come  before  the  mind,  and  a  systematiz- 
ing of  them.  We  feel  our  minds  to  be  growing  and  expanding 
then,  when  we  not  only  learn,  but  refer  what  we  learn  to 
what  we  know  already.  It  is  not  the  mere  addition  to  our 
knowledge  that  is  the  illumination;  but  the  locomotion,  the 
movement  onwards,  of  that  mental  centre,  to  which  both  what 
we  know,  and  what  we  are  learning,  the  accumulating  mass  of 
our  acquirements,  gravitates.^* 

Knowledge  then  is  the  indispensable  condition  of  expansion 
of  mind,  and  the  instrument  of  attaining  to  it;  this  cannot 
be  denied,  it  is  ever  to  be  insisted  on;  I  begin  with  it  as  a 
first  principle;  however,  the  very  truth  of  it  carries  men 
too  far,  and  confirms  to  them  the  notion  that  it  is  the  whole 
of  the  matter.  A  narrow  mind  is  thought  to  be  that  which 
contains  little  knowledge;  and  an  enlarged  mind,  that  which 
holds  a  great  deal ;  and  what  seems  to  put  the  matter  beyond 
dispute  is,  the  fact  of  the  great  number  of  studies  which  are 
pursued  in  a  University,  by  its  very  profession.*' 


To  give  this  liberal  education,  set  forth  thus  in 
noblest  and  happy  phrase  and  comprehensive  and 
inspiring  paragraph,  is  the  primary  purpose  of  a 
university.    Its  business  is  to  make  the  miud  a 

""The  Idea  of  a  University,"  p.  134. 
»/6td.,  p.  129. 


234  EDUCATION 

freeman  of  every  nation,  a  happy  citizen  in  every 
intellectual  zone. 

This  process  of  training,  by  which  the  intellect,  instead 
of  being  formed  or  sacrificed  to  some  particular  or  acci- 
dental purpose,  some  specific  trade  or  profession,  or  study 
or  science,  is  disciplined  for  its  own  sake,  for  the  perception 
of  its  own  proper  object,  and  for  its  own  highest  culture,  is 
called  Liberal  Education ;  and  though  there  is  no  one  in  whom 
it  is  carried  as  far  as  is  conceivable,  or  whose  intellect  would 
be  a  pattern  of  what  intellects  should  be  made,  yet  there 
is  scarcely  any  one  but  may  gain  an  idea  of  what  real  train- 
ing is,  and  at  least  look  towards  it,  and  make  its  true  scope 
and  result,  not  something  else,  his  standard  of  excellence ;  and 
numbers  there  are  who  may  submit  themselves  to  it,  and 
secure  it  to  themselves  in  good  measure.  And  to  set  forth 
the  right  standard,  and  to  train  according  to  it,  and  to 
help  forward  all  students  towards  it  according  to  their  vari- 
ous capacities,  this  I  conceive  to  be  the  business  of  a 
University.*" 

In  giving  such  an  education,  the  university,  of 
course,  is  to  provide  a  broad  and  general,  not  a 
technical,  knowledge.    Newman  says : 

Here  are  two  methods  of  Education;  the  end  of  the  one 
is  to  be  philosophical,  of  the  other  to  be  mechanical ;  the  one 
rises  towards  general  ideas,  the  other  is  exhausted  upon  what 
is  particular  and  external.  Let  me  not  be  thought  to  deny 
the  necessity,  or  to  decry  the  benefit,  of  such  attention  to  what 
is  particular  and  practical,  as  belongs  to  the  useful  or  me- 

"liid.,  pp.  152-153. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    235 

chanical  arts;  life  could  not  go  on  without  them;  we  owe 
our  daily  welfare  to  them ;  their  exercise  is  the  duty  of  the 
many,  and  we  owe  to  the  many  a  debt  of  gratitude  for  ful- 
filling that  duty.  I  only  say  that  Knowledge,  in  proportion 
as  it  tends  more  and  more  to  be  particular,  ceases  to  be 
Knowledge.  It  is  a  question  whether  Knowledge  can  in  any 
proper  sense  be  predicated  of  the  brute  creation ;  without 
pretending  to  metaphysical  exactness  of  phraseology,  which 
would  be  unsuitable  to  an  occasion  like  this,  I  say,  it  seems 
to  me  improper  to  call  that  passive  sensation,  or  perception 
of  things,  which  brutes  seem  to  possess,  by  the  name  of  Knowl- 
edge. When  I  speak  of  Knowledge,  I  mean  something  intel- 
lectual, something  which  grasps  what  it  perceives  through 
the  senses;  something  which  takes  a  view  of  things;  which 
sees  more  than  the  senses  convey;  which  reasons  upon  what 
it  sees,  and  while  it  sees;  which  invests  it  with  an  idea.  It 
expresses  itself,  not  in  a  mere  enunciation,  but  by  an  en- 
thymeme :  it  is  of  the  nature  of  science  from  the  first,  and  in 
this  consists  its  dignity.^^ 

And  so  as  regards  intellectual  culture,  I  am  far  from 
denying  utility  in  this  large  sense  as  the  end  of  Education, 
when  I  lay  it  down,  that  the  culture  of  the  intellect  is  a 
good  in  itself  and  its  own  end;  I  do  not  exclude  from  the 
idea  of  intellectual  culture  what  it  cannot  but  be,  from  the 
very  nature  of  things;  I  only  deny  that  we  must  be  able  to 
point  out,  before  we  have  any  right  to  call  it  useful,  some 
art,  or  business,  or  profession,  or  trade,  or  work,  as  resulting 
from  it,  and  as  its  real  and  complete  end.  The  parallel  is 
exact: — As  the  body  may  be  sacrificed  to  some  manual  or 
other  toil,  whether  moderate  or  oppressive,  so  may  the  intel- 

"Jbid.,  pp.  112-113. 


236  EDUCATION 

lect  be  devoted  to  some  specific  profession ;  and  I  do  not  call 
this  the  culture  of  the  intellect.  Again,  as  some  member  or 
organ  of  the  body  may  be  inordinately  used  and  developed, 
so  may  memory,  or  imagination,  or  the  reasoning  faculty; 
and  this  again  is  not  intellectual  culture.  On  the  other 
hand,  as  the  body  may  be  tended,  cherished,  and  exercised 
with  a  simple  view  to  its  general  health,  so  may  the  intellect 
also  be  generally  exercised  in  order  to  its  perfect  state;  and 
this  is  its  cultivation. 

Again,  as  health  ought  to  precede  labour  of  the  body,  and 
as  a  man  in  health  can  do  what  an  unhealthy  man  cannot 
do,  and  as  of  this  health  the  properties  are  strength,  energy, 
agility,  graceful  carriage  and  action,  manual  dexterity,  and 
endurance  of  fatigue,  so  in  like  manner  general  culture  of 
mind  is  the  best  aid  to  professional  and  scientific  study,  and 
educated  men  can  do  what  illiterate  cannot ;  and  the  man  who 
has  learned  to  think  and  to  reason  and  to  compare  and  to 
discriminate  and  to  analyze,  who  has  refined  his  taste,  and 
formed  his  judgment,  and  sharpened  his  mental  vision,  will 
not  indeed  at  once  be  a  lawyer,  or  a  pleader,  or  an  orator, 
or  a  statesman,  or  a  physician,  or  a  good  landlord,  or  a  man 
of  business,  or  a  soldier,  or  an  engineer,  or  a  chemist,  or  a 
geologist,  or  an  antiquarian,  but  he  will  be  placed  in  that 
state  of  intellect  in  which  he  can  take  up  any  one  of  the 
sciences  or  callings  I  have  referred  to,  or  any  other  for  which 
he  has  a  taste  or  special  talent,  with  an  ease,  a  grace,  a 
versatility,  and  a  success,  to  which  another  is  a  stranger.  In 
this  sense  then,  and  as  yet  I  have  said  but  a  very  few  words  on 
a  large  subject,  mental  culture  is  emphatically  useful}^ 

^Ibid.,  pp.  165-166. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    237 

The  task,  therefore,  of  founding  and  carrying 
forward  a  university  is  among  the  noblest  which 
can  engage  the  powers  of  man : 

To  set  on  foot  and  to  maintain  in  life  and  vigour  a  real 
University,  is  confessedly,,  as  soon  as  the  word  "University" 
is  understood,  one  of  those  greatest  works,  great  in  their 
difficulty  and  their  importance,  on  which  are  deservedly  ex- 
pended the  rarest  intellects  and  the  most  varied  endowments. 
For,  first  of  all,  it  professes  to  teach  whatever  has  to  be 
taught  in  any  whatever  department  of  human  knowledge,  and 
it  embraces  in  its  scope  the  loftiest  subjects  of  human  thought, 
and  the  richest  fields  of  human  inquiry.  Nothing  is  too  vast, 
nothing  too  subtle,  nothing  too  distant,  nothing  too  minute, 
nothing  too  discursive,  nothing  too  exact,  to  engage  its 
attention.^' 

This,  Gentlemen,  is  why  I  say  that  to  erect  a  University  is 
at  once  so  arduous  and  beneficial  an  undertaking,  viz.,  be- 
cause it  is  pledged  to  admit,  without  fear,  without  prejudice, 
without  compromise,  all  comers,  if  they  come  in  the  name 
of  Truth ;  to  adjust  views,  and  experiences,  and  habits  of 
mind  the  most  independent  and  dissimilar;  and  to  give  full 
play  to  thought  and  erudition  in  their  most  original  forms, 
and  their  most  intense  expressions,  and  in  their  most  ample 
circuit.  Thus  to  draw  many  things  into  one,  is  its  special 
function ;  and  it  learns  to  do  it,  not  by  rules  reducible  to 
writing,  but  by  sagacity,  wisdom,  and  forbearance,  acting 
upon  a  profound  insight  into  the  subject-matter  of  knowledge, 
and  by  a  vigilant  repression  of  aggression  or  bigotry  in  any 
quarter.^" 

»/&iJ.,  p.  457. 
*Ibid.,  p.  458. 


238  EDUCATION 

What  an  empire  is  in  political  history,  such  is  a  University 
in  the  sphere  of  philosophy  and  research.  It  is,  as  I  have 
said,  the  high  protecting  power  of  all  knowledge  and  science, 
of  fact  and  principle,  of  inquiry  and  discovery,  of  experiment 
and  speculation;  it  maps  out  the  territory  of  the  intellect, 
and  sees  that  the  boundaries  of  each  province  are  religiously 
respected,  and  that  there  is  neither  encroachment  nor  sur- 
render on  any  side.  It  acts  as  umpire  between  truth  and 
truth,  and,  taking  into  account  the  nature  and  importance 
of  each,  assigns  to  all  their  due  order  of  precedence.  It  main- 
tains no  one  department  of  thought  exclusively,  however  ample 
and  noble ;  and  it  sacrifices  none.  It  is  deferential  and  loyal, 
according  to  their  respective  weight,  to  the  claims  of  litera- 
ture, of  physical  research,  of  history,  of  metaphysics,  of  theo- 
logical science.  It  is  impartial  towards  them  all,  and  pro- 
motes each  in  its  own  place  and  for  its  own  object.^^ 

The  sum  of  the  work  of  a  university  on  its  human 
side  may  be  said  to  be  that : 

Liberal  Education  makes  not  the  Christian,  not  the  Catho- 
lic, but  the  gentleman.  It  is  well  to  be  a  gentleman,  it  is 
well  to  have  a  cultivated  intellect,  a  delicate  taste,  a  candid, 
equitable,  dispassionate  mind,  a  noble  and  courteous  bearing 
in  the  conduct  of  life; — these  are  the  connatural  qualities 
of  a  large  knowledge ;  they  are  the  objects  of  a  University.^^ 

In  one  of  the  greatest  of  all  passages  of  litera- 
ture Newman  sums  up  the  purpose  and  service  of  a 
university  in  his  interpretation  of  a  gentleman : 

'^Ibid.,  p.  459. 
''Ibid.,  p.  120. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN     239 

It  is  almost  a  definition  of  a  gentleman  to  say  he  is  one 
who  never  inflicts  pain.  This  description  is  both  refined  and, 
as  far  as  it  goes,  accurate.  lie  is  mainly  occupied  in  merely 
removing  the  obstacles  which  hinder  the  free  and  unembar- 
rassed action  of  those  about  him;  and  he  concurs  with  their 
movements  rather  than  takes  the  initiative  himself.  Ilis  bene- 
fits may  be  considered  as  parallel  to  what  are  called  com- 
forts or  conveniences  in  arrangements  of  a  personal  nature: 
like  an  easy  chair  or  a  good  fire,  which  do  their  part  in  dis- 
pelling cold  and  fatigue,  though  nature  provides  both  means 
of  rest  and  animal  heat  without  them.  Tho  true  gentleman 
in  like  manner  carefully  avoids  whatever  may  cause  a  jar  or 
a  jolt  in  the  minds  of  those  with  whom  he  is  cast; — all  clash- 
ing of  opinion,  or  collision  of  feeling,  all  restraint,  or  suspi- 
cion, or  gloom,  or  resentment;  his  great  concern  being  to 
make  every  one  at  their  ease  and  at  home.  He  has  his  eyes 
on  all  his  company ;  he  is  tender  towards  the  bashful,  gentle 
towards  the  distant,  and  merciful  towards  the  absurd ;  he  can 
recollect  to  whom  he  is  speaking ;  he  guards  against  unseason- 
able allusions,  or  topics  which  may  irritate;  he  is  seldom 
prominent  in  conversation,  and  never  wearisome.  He  makes 
light  of  favours  while  he  does  them,  and  seems  to  be  receiv- 
ing when  he  is  conferring.  He  never  speaks  of  himself  except 
when  compelled,  never  defends  himself  by  a  mere  retort,  he 
has  no  ears  for  slander  or  gossip,  is  scrupulous  in  imputing 
motives  to  those  who  interfere  with  him,  and  interprets  every- 
thing for  the  best.  He  is  never  mean  or  little  in  his  dis- 
putes, never  takes  unfair  advantage,  never  mistakes  person- 
alities or  sharp  sayings  for  arguments,  or  insinuates  evil 
which  he  dare  not  say  out.  From  a  long-sighted  prudence, 
he  observes  the  maxim  of  the  ancient  sage,  that  we  should 
ever  conduct  ourselves  towards  our  enemy  as  if  he  were  one 


240  EDUCATION 

day  to  be  our  friend.  He  has  too  much  good  sense  to  be 
affronted  at  insults,  he  is  too  well  employed  to  remember 
injuries,  and  too  indolent  to  bear  malice.  He  is  patient,  for- 
bearing, and  resigned,  on  philosophical  principles;  he  sub- 
mits to  pain,  because  it  is  inevitable,  to  bereavement,  because 
it  is  irreparable,  and  to  death,  because  it  is  his  destiny.  If 
he  engages  in  controversy  of  any  kind,  his  disciplined  in- 
tellect preserves  him  from  the  blundering  discourtesy  of 
better,  perhaps,  but  less  educated  minds;  who,  like  blunt 
weapons,  tear  and  hack  instead  of  cutting  clean,  who  mistake 
the  point  in  argument,  waste  their  strength  on  trifles,  mis- 
conceive their  adversary,  and  leave  the  question  more  in- 
volved than  they  find  it.  He  may  be  right  or  wrong  in  his 
opinion,  but  he  is  too  clear-headed  to  be  unjust;  he  is  as 
simple  as  he  is  forcible,  and  as  brief  as  he  is  decisive.  No- 
where shall  we  find  greater  candour,  consideration,  in- 
dulgence :  he  throws  himself  into  the  minds  of  his  opponents, 
he  accounts  for  their  mistakes.  He  knows  the  weakness  of 
human  reason  as  well  as  its  strength,  its  province  and  its 
limits.  If  he  be  an  unbeliever,  he  will  be  too  profound  and 
large-minded  to  ridicule  religion  or  to  act  against  it;  he 
is  too  wise  to  be  a  dogmatist  or  fanatic  in  his  infidelity.  He 
respects  piety  and  devotion;  he  even  supports  institutions 
as  venerable,  beautiful,  or  useful,  to  which  he  does  not  assent ; 
he  honours  the  ministers  of  religion,  and  it  contents  him  to 
decline  its  mysteries  without  assailing  or  denouncing  them. 
He  is  a  friend  of  religious  toleration,  and  that,  not  only  be- 
cause his  philosophy  has  taught  him  to  look  on  all  forms  of 
faith  with  an  impartial  eye,  but  also  from  the  gentleness 
and  effeminacy  of  feeling,  which  is  the  attendant  on  civili- 
zation.^* 

"Ibid.,  pp.  208-210. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    241 

A  liberal  education,  the  giving  of  which  is  the 
peculiar  and  beautiful  purpose  of  a  university, 
represents  activity  of  the  intellectual  forces  of 
man.  With  charming  irony  Newman  discourses  on 
securing  such  an  education  without  money  and 
without  the  price  of  toil. 

Learning  is  to  be  without  exertion,  without  attention,  with- 
out toil ;  without  grounding,  without  advance,  without  finish- 
ing. There  is  to  be  nothing  individual  in  it;  and  this,  for 
sooth,  is  the  wonder  of  the  age.  What  the  steam  engine  does 
with  matter,  the  printing  press  is  to  do  with  mind;  it  is  to 
act  mechanically,  and  the  population  is  to  be  passively,  almost 
unconsciously  enlightened,  by  the  mere  multiplication  and 
dissemination  of  volumes.  Whether  it  be  the  school  boy,  or 
the  school  girl,  or  the  youth  at  college,  or  the  mechanic  in 
the  town,  or  the  politician  in  the  senate,  all  have  been  the 
victims  in  one  way  or  other  of  this  most  preposterous  and 
pernicious  of  delusions.  Wise  men  have  lifted  up  their  voices 
in  vain;  and  at  length,  lest  their  own  institutions  should  be 
outshone  and  should  disappear  in  the  folly  of  the  hour,  they 
have  been  obliged,  as  far  as  they  could  with  a  good  conscience, 
to  humour  a  spirit  which  they  could  not  withstand,  and  make 
temporizing  concessions  at  which  they  could  not  but  inwardly 
smile.^* 

And  yet  learning  is  not  to  be  made  a  mechanical 
process,  but  an  unconscious  growth  and  vital  ab- 
sorption of  forces. 

»*7&td.,  pp.  142-143. 


242  EDUCATION 

I  protest  to  you,  Gentlemen,  that  if  I  had  to  choose  be- 
tween a  so-called  University,  which  dispensed  with  residence 
and  tutorial  superintendence,  and  gave  its  degrees  to  any 
person  who  passed  an  examination  in  a  wide  range  of  sub- 
jects, and  a  University  which  had  no  professors  or  examina- 
tions at  all,  but  merely  brought  a  number  of  young  men 
together  for  three  or  four  years,  and  then  sent  them  away  as 
the  University  of  Oxford  is  said  to  have  done  some  sixty  years 
since,  if  I  were  asked  which  of  these  two  methods  was  the 
better  discipline  of  the  intellect, — mind,  I  do  not  say  which 
is  morally  the  better,  for  it  is  plain  that  compulsory  study 
must  be  a  good  and  idleness  an  intolerable  mischief, — but  if 
I  must  determine  which  of  the  two  courses  was  the  more 
successful  in  training,  moulding,  enlarging  the  mind,  which 
sent  out  men  the  more  fitted  for  their  secular  duties,  which 
produced  better  public  men,  men  of  the  world,  men  whose 
names  would  descend  to  posterity,  I  have  no  hesitation  in 
giving  the  preference  to  that  University  which  did  nothing, 
over  that  which  exacted  of  its  members  an  acquaintance  with 
every  science  under  the  sun.^^ 


In  this  educative  process,  the  learned  cardinal 
gives  an  exalted  place  to  religion.  Religion  repre- 
sents the  greatest  thoughts  which  influence  or  in- 
struct the  mind  and  the  noblest  emotions  which  fill 
the  heart.  To  persons  who  are  said  to  be  unedu- 
cated religion  seems  often  to  give  an  enlargement 
of  the  mind  which  is  nothing  less  than  a  liberal 

"Ibid.,  p.  145. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    243 

education.    The  new  birth  of  the  heart  produces 
an  intellectual  new  birth. 

It  is  often  remarked  of  uneducated  persons,  who  hitherto 
have  lived  without  seriousness,  that  on  their  turning  to  God, 
looking  into  themselves,  regulating  their  hearts,  reforming 
their  conduct,  and  studying  the  inspired  Word,  they  seem 
to  become,  in  point  of  intellect,  different  beings  from  what 
they  were  before.  Before,  they  took  things  as  they  came, 
and  thought  no  more  of  one  thing  than  of  another.  But 
now  every  event  has  a  meaning;  they  form  their  own  esti- 
mate of  whatever  occurs;  they  recollect  times  and  seasons; 
and  the  world,  instead  of  being  like  the  stream  which  the 
countryman  gazed  on,  ever  in  motion  and  never  in  prog- 
ress, is  a  various  and  complicated  drama,  with  parts  and  with 
an  object.'*' 

The  education  which  is  given  by  religion,  or 
which  is  given  in  the  atmosphere  of  the  institutions 
of  religion,  is  still  to  be  free  and  liberal.  Ward 
quotes  a  remark  of  the  cardinal  made  in  his  first 
university  sermon  in  Dublin,  to  the  effect : 

Some  persons  will  say  that  I  am  thinking  of  confining,  dis- 
torting, and  stunting  the  growth  of  the  intellect  by  ecclesi- 
astical supervision.  I  have  no  such  thought.  Nor  have  I 
any  thought  of  a  compromise,  as  if  religion  must  give  up 
something,  and  science  something.  I  wish  the  intellect  to 
range  with  the  utmost  freedom,  and  religion  to  enjoy  an 
equal  freedom;  but  what  I  am  stipulating  for  is,  that  they 

""Oxford  University  Sermons,"  p.  285. 


244  EDUCATION 

should  be  found  in  one  and  the  same  place,  and  exemplified 
in  the  same  persons.  I  want  to  destroy  that  diversity  of  cen- 
tres which  puts  everything  into  confusion  by  creating  a  con- 
trariety of  influences.  I  wish  the  same  spots  and  the  same 
individuals  to  be  at  once  oracles  of  philosophy  and  shrines  of 
devotion.  I  want  the  intellectual  layman  to  be  religious,  and 
the  devout  ecclesiastic  to  be  intellectual.^^ 

Newman  believes  that  the  Catholic  church  should 
have  colleges  for  its  own  members.  The  Dublin 
experiment,  even  though  it  proved  to  be  a  failure, 
testifies  to  the  sincerity  of  his  deep  conviction. 

As  to  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  it  is  quite  plain  that  the 
Church  ought  to  have  Schools  (Universities)  of  her  own. 
She  can  in  Ireland — she  can't  in  England,  a  Protestant  coun- 
try. How  are  you  to  prepare  young  Catholics  for  taking 
part  in  life,  in  filling  stations  in  a  Protestant  country  as  Eng- 
land, without  going  to  the  English  Universities?  Impossi- 
ble. Either  then  refuse  to  let  Catholics  avail  themselves  of 
these  privileges,  of  going  into  Parliament,  of  taking  their 
seat  in  the  House  of  Lords,  of  becoming  Lawyers,  Commis- 
sioners, etc.  etc.  or  let  them  go  there,  where  alone  they  will 
be  able  to  put  themselves  on  a  par  with  Protestants.  Argu- 
ment the  1st. 

2.  They  will  get  more  harm  in  London  life  than  at  Oxford 
or  Cambridge.  A  boy  of  19  goes  to  some  London  office,  with 
no  restraint — he  goes  at  that  age  to  Oxford  or  Cambridge, 
and  is  at  least  under  some  restraint. 

3.  Why  are  you  not  consistent,  and  forbid  him  to  go  into 

"Ward's  "Life  of,"  etc.,  Vol.  I.,  p.  395. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    245 

the  ArmyT  why  don't  you  forbid  him  to  go  to  such  an 
"Academy"  at  Woolwich?  lie  may  get  at  Woolwich  as 
much  harm  in  his  faith  and  morals  as  at  the  Universities. 

4.  There  are  two  sets  at  Oxford.  What  Fr.  B.  says  of 
the  good  set  being  small,  is  bosh.  At  least  I  have  a  right 
to  know  better  than  he.  What  can  he  know  about  my  means 
of  knowledge?  I  was  Tutor  (in  a  very  rowing  College,  and 
was  one  of  those  who  changed  its  character).  I  was  Dean 
of  discipline — I  was  Pro-proctor.  The  good  set  was  not  a 
small  set — tho'  it  varied  in  number  in  different  colleges." 

Literature,  moreover,  as  well  as  religion,  bears  a 
close  relation  to  the  higher  education.  Of  litera- 
ture, in  a  characteristic  passage,  this  master  of 
style  says : 

If  a  literature  be,  as  I  have  said,  the  voice  of  a  particular 
nation,  it  requires  a  territory  and  a  period,  as  large  as  that 
nation's  extent  and  history,  to  mature  in.  It  is  broader  and 
deeper  than  the  capacity  of  any  body  of  men,  however  gifted, 
or  any  system  of  teaching,  however  true.  It  is  the  exponent, 
not  of  truth,  but  of  nature,  which  is  true  only  in  its  elements. 
It  is  the  result  of  the  mutual  action  of  a  hundred  simultaneous 
influences  and  operations,  and  the  issue  of  a  hundred  strange 
accidents  in  independent  places  and  times;  it  is  the  scanty 
compensating  produce  of  the  wild  discipline  of  the  world 
and  of  life,  so  fruitful  in  failures;  and  it  is  the  concen- 
tration of  those  rare  manifestations  of  intellectual  power 
which  no  one  can  account  for.  It  is  made  up,  in  the  particular 
language    here    under   consideration,    of   human    beings    as 

*76td,  VoL  II.,  p.  70. 


246  EDUCATION 

heterogeneous  as  Burns  and  Bunyan,  De  Foe  and  Johnson, 
Goldsmith  and  Cowper,  Law  and  Fielding,  Scott  and  Byron. 
The  remark  has  been  made  that  the  history  of  an  author 
is  the  history  of  his  works;  it  is  far  more  exact  to  say  that, 
at  least  in  the  case  of  great  writers,  the  history  of  their  works 
is  the  history  of  their  fortunes  or  their  times.  Each  is, 
in  his  turn,  the  man  of  his  age,  the  type  of  a  generation, 
or  the  interpreter  of  a  crisis.  He  is  made  for  his  day,  and  his 
day  for  him.  Hooker  would  not  have  been,  but  for  the  exist- 
ence of  Catholics  and  Puritans,  the  defeat  of  the  former  and 
the  rise  of  the  latter;  Clarendon  would  not  have  been  with- 
out the  Great  Rebellion ;  Hobbes  is  the  prophet  of  the  reaction 
to  scoffing  infidelity;  and  Addison  is  the  child  of  the  Revo- 
lution and  its  attendant  changes.  If  there  be  any  of  our 
classical  authors,  who  might  at  first  sight  have  been  pro- 
nounced a  University  man,  with  the  exception  of  Johnson, 
Addison  is  he;  yet  even  Addison,  the  son  and  brother  of 
clergymen,  the  fellow  of  an  Oxford  Society,  the  resident  of 
a  College  which  still  points  to  the  walk  which  he  planted, 
must  be  something  more,  in  order  to  take  his  place  among 
the  Classics  of  the  language,  and  owed  the  variety  of  his 
matter  to  his  experience  of  life,  and  to  the  call  made  on  his 
resources  by  the  exigencies  of  his  day.  The  world  he  lived  in 
made  him  and  used  him.  While  his  writings  educated  his 
own  generation,  they  have  delineated  it  for  all  posterity  after 
him.^' 

In  the  appreciation  of  literature,  and  also  as 
helpful  in  writing,  Newman  made  some  notes  in 
the  year  1868.    They  are  perhaps  no  less  useful  in 

»"Th©  Idea  of  a  Universit7,"  p.  311. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    247 

1916  and  for  general  purposes,  though  they  were 
made  primarily  on  the  writing  of  sermons: 

1.  A  man  should  be  in  earnest,  by  which  I  mean  he  should 
write  not  for  the  sake  of  writing,  but  to  bring  out  his 
thoughts. 

2.  He  should  never  aim  at  being  eloquent. 

3.  He  should  keep  his  idea  in  view,  and  should  write  sen- 
tences over  and  over  again  till  he  has  expressed  his  mean- 
ing accurately,  forcibly,  and  in  few  words. 

4.  He  should  aim  at  being  understood  by  his  hearers  or 
readers. 

5.  He  should  use  words  which  are  likely  to  be  understood. 
Ornament  and  amplification  will  come  spontaneously  in  due 
titae,  but  he  should  never  seek  them. 

6.  He  must  creep  before  he  can  fly,  by  which  I  mean  that 
humility  which  is  a  great  Christian  virtue  has  a  place  in  lit- 
erary composition. 

7.  He  who  is  ambitious  will  never  write  well,  but  he  who 
tries  to  say  simply  what  he  feels,  what  religion  demands, 
what  faith  teaches,  what  the  Gospel  promises,  will  be  elo- 
quent without  intending  it,  arid  will  write  better  English  than 
if  he  made  a  study  of  English  literature.'" 

In  this  relation  it  may  not  be  amiss  to  quote  his 
remark  in  respect  to  the  hardship  he  found  in  his 
own  writing.  The  remark  illustrates  the  old  truth 
that  hard  writing  makes  easy  reading. 

If  I  had  my  way  I  should  give  myself  up  to  verse-making; 
it  is  nearly  the  only  kind  of  composition  which  is  not  a 
*  Ward's  "Life  of,"  etc..  Vol.  II.,  p.  335. 


248  EDUCATION 

trouble  to  me,  but  I  have  never  had  time.  As  to  my  prose 
volumes,  I  have  scarcely  written  any  one  without  an  external 
stimulus;  their  composition  has  been  to  me,  in  point  of  pain, 
a  mental  childbearing,  and  I  have  been  accustomed  to  say 
to  myself:    "In  sorrow  shalt  thou  bring  forth  children. "^^ 

Thus  writes  Newman  of  the  nature  of  the  human 
reason  as  touched  by  the  liberalizing  force  of  edu- 
cation. His  interpretations  are  among  the  most 
moving  ever  given  to  the  mind  of  a  man  to  offer 
to  his  fellows.  Education,  he  says,  further,  is  a 
social  process.  His  objections,  therefore,  to  soli- 
tary self -education  are  weighty,  and  it  may  be 
added,  timely: 

Nay,  self-education  in  any  shape,  in  the  most  restricted 
sense,  is  preferable  to  a  system  of  teaching  which,  professing 
so  much,  really  does  so  little  for  the  mind.  Shut  your  Col- 
lege gates  against  the  votary  of  knowledge,  throw  him  back 
upon  the  searchings  and  the  efforts  of  his  own  mind;  he 
will  gain  by  being  spared  an  entrance  into  your  Babel.  Few 
indeed  there  are  who  can  dispense  with  the  stimulus  and 
support  of  instructors,  or  will  do  anything  at  all,  if  left  to 
themselves.  And  fewer  still  (though  such  great  minds  are 
to  be  found),  who  will  not,  from  such  unassisted  attempts, 
contract  a  self-reliance  and  a  self-esteem,  which  are  not  only 
moral  evils,  but  serious  hindrances  to  the  attainment  of 
truth.  And  next  to  none,  perhaps,  or  none,  who  will  not 
be  reminded  from  time  to  time  of  the  disadvantage  under 

«Z6td.,  p.  204. 


ACCORDING  TO  JOHN  NEWMAN    249 

which  they  lie,  by  their  imperfect  grounding,  by  the  breaks, 
deficiencies,  and  irregularities  of  their  knowledge,  by  the 
eccentricity  of  opinion  and  the  confusion  of  principle  which 
they  exhibit.  They  will  be  too  often  ignorant  of  what  every 
one  knows  and  takes  for  granted,  of  that  multitude  of  small 
truths  which  fall  upon  the  mind  like  dust,  impalpable  and 
ever  accumulating ;  they  may  be  unable  to  converse,  they  may 
argue  perversely,  they  may  pride  themselves  on  their  worst 
paradoxes  or  their  grossest  truisms,  they  may  be  full  of  their 
own  mode  of  viewing  things,  unwilling  to  be  put  out  of  their 
way,  slow  to  ent^r  into  the  minds  of  others ; — but,  with  these 
and  whatever  other  liabilities  upon  their  heads,  they  are  likely 
to  have  more  thought,  more  mind,  more  philosophy,  more  true 
enlargement,  than  those  earnest  but  ill-used  persons,  who  are 
forced  to  load  their  minds  with  a  score  of  subjects  against  an 
examination,  who  have  too  much  on  their  hands  to  indulge 
themselves  in  thinking  or  investigation,  who  devour  premiss 
and  conclusion  together  with  indiscriminate  greediness,  who 
hold  whole  sciences  on  faith,  and  commit  demonstrations  to 
memory,  and  who  too  often,  as  might  be  expected,  when  their 
period  of  education  is  passed,  throw  up  all  they  have  learned 
in  disgust,  having  gained  nothing  really  by  their  anxious 
labours,  except  perhaps  the  habit  of  application,'* 

In  Newman,  the  ecclesiastic,  the  scholar,  the 
writer,  the  educationist,  are  united  apparently  con- 
tradictory principles  and  methods  of  thought.  A 
cardinal  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  he  yet  was 
for  a  time  a  rector  of  the  University  of  his  Church 
and  as  rector  was  obliged  to  secure  for  young  men 

""The  Idea  of  a  University,"  pp.  148-149. 


250  EDUCATION 

a  rational  point  of  view  of  the  fundamental  disci- 
plines, of  scholarship,  and  of  learning.  Noble  were 
the  pleas  and  strong  the  arguments  which  this 
ecclesiastic  made  for  intellectual  freedom  within 
academic  walls.  He  sought  in  practice  and  in  writ- 
ing to  reconcile  scientific  research  with  theological 
development.  He  wished  to  create  in  the  same 
personalities  able  thinkers  and  loyal  Roman  Cath- 
olic believers.  He  sought  within  the  same  academic 
hall  to  erect  the  altar  of  faith  and  the  chemical 
laboratory.  He  desired  to  create  and  to  nurture  a 
religious  education  which  should  be  liberal  and 
liberalizing  to  the  minds  of  the  students,  and  also 
to  promote  a  liberal  education  which  should  con- 
firm their  belief  in  the  traditions  and  doctrines  of 
his  historic  Church.  He  tried  to  do  what  many 
today  would  declare  cannot  be  done.  But  his  inter- 
pretations of  the  educational  and  religious  condi- 
tions attending  his  endeavors  are  full  of  meaning, 
and  his  whole  conception  of  the  nature  and  func- 
tions, of  the  purposes  and  results,  of  that  educa- 
tional process  is  pregnant  with  lasting  lessons  to 
the  mind  and  the  conscience  of  man. 


vin 

EDUCATION   ACCORDING  TO  CJOETHE 

GOETHE  was  the  most  universal  mind  of  his 
time — and  his  time  was  long  and  significant — 
and  one  of  the  universal  minds  of  any  period.  His 
is  a  unique  place  like  that  belonging  to  Leonardo 
da  Vinci  and  Bruno.  If  one  does  not  feel  quite 
free  to  apply  to  him  the  words  which  are  applied  to 
Socrates  in  the  last  paragraph  of  Phaedo,  **the 
wisest,  justest  and  best  of  all  the  men  whom  I  have 
ever  known,"  one  can  at  least  say  that  his  was  one 
of  the  most  human  and  humanistic  lives  lived  in  all 
the  centuries. 

The  main  currents  of  Goethe's  development  were 
fed  by  three  great  springs,  the  Greek,  the  Chris- 
tian, and  the  modem  search  for  natural  truth  and 
law.  From  the  first  came  his  serenity,  from  the 
second  his  joy,  and  from  the  third,  his  rapture  in 
revelation.  Natural  law  he  held  to  be  divine  law. 
Pursuing  the  middle  course  in  life,  he  was  free 
from  the  fantastic  and  eccentric,  and  he  embodied 
the  moderation  which  lies  between  original  un- 

251 


252  EDUCATION 

restrained  nature,  and  the  artificial  restricted  life 
of  man.  The  light  of  wisdom  burned  for  him 
throughout  his  journey.  He  had  a  clear  eye  for  the 
concrete,  the  actual,  the  living.  Truth  and  duty 
rested  over  him  and  his  great  career  as  a  nimbus. 

The  universality  of  his  relationship  emerges  in 
the  place  of  his  birth  as  well  as  in  more  personal 
conditions  and  forces.  Frankfort  in  the  year  1749 
and  the  years  following  his  birth  was  a  mediaeval 
fortress,  treasuring  the  memorials  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  yet  being  a  center  of  commerce  and  of  indus- 
trialism. The  ancient  and  the  modern  were  joined 
together  in  peaceful  picturesqueness.  The  ancient 
storks  still  looked  down  from  their  gables  upon  the 
affairs  of  modern  mercantile  life. 

The  home,  too,  united  diverse  conditions.  It  was 
a  German  home  in  its  origin,  yet  the  husband  and 
the  father  had  lived  in  Italy  and  the  house  in  pic- 
ture and  other  memorial  bore  evidences  of  his  resi- 
dence in  that  historic  peninsula.  It  was,  moreover, 
a  home  of  simple  competencies  standing  midway 
between  poverty  and  wealth.  It  represented  the 
Aristotelian  golden  mean  in  which  are  gathered  up 
the  most  enduring  results,  and  the  most  inspiring 
forces,  of  human  achievement  and  personal  char- 
acter. 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  253 

The  age  as  well  as  the  place  was  significant.  It  is 
not  without  meaning,  that,  in  the  year  of  Goethe's 
birth,  Rousseau  was  arguing  with  the  encyclopae- 
dists, Gibbon  was  trying  to  master  the  grammar  of 
the  people  whose  history  he  was  to  write,  Johnson 
was  making  his  dictionary,  and  Buffon  published 
the  first  volume  of  his  natural  history. 

But  it  is  still  more  significant  that  within  the 
greatest  period  of  his  life,  in  the  last  decades  of  the 
eighteenth,  and  the  first  of  the  nineteenth,  century, 
are  united  the  rise  and  the  fall  of  Napoleon.  In 
this  period  are  seen  finally  the  close  of  the  middle 
ages,  and  the  ultimate  dissolution  of  the  Holy 
Roman  Empire.  It  was  also  the  period  of  the  rise 
of  the  transcendental  movement  in  philosophic  in- 
terpretation. It  was  the  age  of  Kant,  who,  in  his 
provincial  university  of  Koenigsberg,  rubbed  off 
the  dimness  of  the  vision  of  philosophy  and  gave 
to  it  a  new  outlook  and  inlook,  and  a  consequent 
new  life.  It  was  the  age  of  Fichte,  of  the  Von 
Hmnboldts,  and  of  the  founding  of  the  University 
of  Berlin,  a  child  of  hope,  bom  in  a  day  of  despair, 
that  has  in  many  ways  for  a  hundred  years,  led  the 
profounder  thought  of  humanity.  Most  material- 
istic and  most  spiritual  were  the  forces  of  the 
period  which  Goethe 's  life  covered. 


254  EDUCATION 

Goethe  has  himself  pictured  this  life : 

The  epoch  in  which  we  were  living  might  be  called  an  epoch 
of  high  requisitions,  for  every  one  demanded  of  himself  and 
of  others  what  no  mortal  had  hitherto  accomplished.  On 
chosen  spirits  who  could  think  and  feel,  a  light  had  arisen, 
which  enabled  them  to  see  that  an  immediate,  original  un- 
derstanding of  nature,  and  a  course  of  action  based  upon  it, 
was  both  the  best  thing  a  man  could  desire,  and  also  not 
difficult  to  attain.  Experience  thus  once  more  became  the 
universal  watchword,  and  every  one  opened  his  eyes  as  wide 
as  he  could.  Physicians,  especially,  had  a  most  pressing  call 
to  labour  to  this  end,  and  the  best  opportunity  for  finding  it. 
Upon  them  a  star  shone  out  of  antiquity,  which  could  serve 
as  an  example  of  all  that  was  to  be  desired.  The  writings 
which  had  come  down  to  us  under  the  name  of  Hippocrates, 
furnished  a  model  of  the  way  in  which  a  man  should  both 
observe  the  world  and  relate  what  he  had  seen,  without  mix- 
ing up  himself  with  it.  But  no  one  considered  that  we  can- 
not see  like  the  Greeks,  and  that  we  shall  never  become  such 
poets,  sculptors,  and  physicians  as  they  were.  Even  granted 
that  we  could  learn  from  them,  still  the  results  of  experience 
already  gone  through,  were  almost  beyond  number,  and  be- 
sides were  not  always  of  the  clearest  kind ;  moreover  had  too 
often  been  made  to  accord  with  preconceived  opinions.  All 
these  were  to  be  mastered,  discriminated,  and  sifted.  This 
also,  was  an  immense  demand.  Then  again  it  was  required 
that  each  observer,  in  his  personal  sphere  and  labours,  should 
acquaint  himself  with  the  true,  healthy  nature,  as  if  she  were 
now  for  the  first  time  noticed  and  attended,  and  thus  only 
what  was  genuine  and  real  was  to  be  learned.  But  as,  in  gen- 
eral, learning  can  never  exist  without  the  accompaniment 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  255 

of  a  universal  smattering  and  a  universal  pedantry,  nor  the 
practice  of  any  profession  without  empiricism  and  char- 
latanry, 80  there  sprung  up  a  violent  conflict,  the  purpose  of 
which  was  to  guard  use  from  ahuse,  and  place  the  kernel 
high  above  the  shell  in  men's  estimation.  In  the  execution 
of  this  design,  it  was  perceived  that  the  shortest  way  of 
getting  out  of  the  affair,  was  to  call  in  the  aid  of  genius, 
whose  magic  gifts  could  settle  the  strife,  and  accomplish  what 
was  required.  Meanwhile,  however,  the  understanding  med- 
dled with  the  matter;  all  it  alleged  must  be  reduced  to  clear 
notions,  and  exhibited  in  a  logical  form,  that  every  preju- 
dice might  be  put  aside  and  all  superstition  destroyed.^ 

The  interpretations  which  Goethe  gives  to  educa- 
tion are  found  scattered  throughout  his  numberless 
works.  The  autobiography  of  Wilhelm  Meister, 
however,  contains  possibly  the  most  pregnant  and 
important  parts.  But  from  the  reports  of  the  con- 
versations, covering  several  decades,  may  be  drawn 
forth  sentiments  and  judgments,  often  embodied 
in  single  sentences,  which  have  large  meaning. 

These  opinions,  like  Goethe's  character,  often 
unite  opposing  doctrines  and  antagonistic  intima- 
tions. They  are  also,  like  his  own  education,  fre- 
quently without  orderliness,  filled  with  sentiments 
which  would  not  bear  logical  analyzing,  yet  which, 
as  by  a  sudden  rift  of  light,  give  guidance  in  ob- 

*"The  Autobiography  of  Goethe,"  John  Oxenford.  Bell's  edition, 
1903,  VoL  II.,  pp.  54,  55. 


256  EDUCATION 

scurity,  and  inspiration  to  indifference,  in  thinking. 
A  single  verse  of  Faust  may  have  as  deep  educa- 
tional significance  as  a  whole  paragraph  of  the 
scientific  work  on  optics.  The  by-products  of  a 
great  mind,  working  in  any  field,  are  often  indeed 
more  precious  than  the  direct  results  of  the  hard 
labor  of  a  second-rate  intellect. 

The  principles  which  through  these  diverse  ma- 
terials may  be  found  and  brought  to  light,  are  also 
more  or  less  contradictory,  yet  even  possibly  be- 
cause of  their  opposing  content,  they  may  often  be 
joined  together  in  a  stronger  and  larger  unity. 

One  of  the  great  principles  of  Goethe  lies  in  the 
assurance  that  education  consists  rather  in  the  un- 
folding of  the  powers  with  which  the  mind  is  orig- 
inally endowed,  than  in  the  engrafting  of  forces 
upon  the  mind,  however  vital,  from  without.  To 
him,  education  is  primarily  subjective. 

To  labor  for  his  own  moral  culture,  is  the  simplest  and 
most  practicable  thing  which  man  can  propose  to  himself; 
the  impulse  is  inborn  in  him ;  while  in  social  life  both  reason 
and  love,  prompt  or  rather  force  him  to  do  so.^ 

Man  may  seek  his  higher  destination  on  earth  or  in  heaven, 
in  the  present  or  in  the  future,  he  yet  remains  on  this  account 
exposed  to  an  eternal  wavering,  to  an  influence  from  without 
which  ever  disturbs  him,  until  he  once  for  all  makes  a  reso- 

'Ibid.,  p.  74. 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  257 

lution  to  declare  that  that  is  right,  which  is  suitable  to  him- 
self." 

For  he  too  was  a  child  of  nature, — ^he  too  had  worked  his 
way  upwards.  What  others  had  been  compelled  to  cast  away, 
he  had  never  possessed ;  relations  of  society  from  which  they 
would  have  to  emancipate  themselves,  had  never  fettered  him. 
Thus  might  he  be  regarded  as  one  of  the  purest  disciples 
of  that  gospel  of  nature,  and  in  view  of  his  own  persevering 
efforts  and  his  conduct  as  a  man  and  son,  he  might  well 
exclaim,  ' '  All  is  good  as  it  com.es  from  the  hands  of  nature !  * ' 
But  the  conclusion,  "All  is  corrupted  in  the  hands  of  man!" 
was  also  forced  upon  him  by  adverse  experience.* 

Let  man,  we  say,  learn  to  think  of  himself  as  being  with- 
out any  enduring  external  relation;  let  him  seek  for  consist- 
ency not  in  his  surroundings  but  in  himself:  there  he  will 
find  it;  cherish  and  foster  it  with  love;  he  will  form  and 
educate  himself  so  as  to  be  everywhere  at  home.  He  who 
devotes  himself  to  what  is  most  necessary,  goes  everywhere 
most  surely  to  his  goal.  Others,  on  the  contrary,  seeking  what 
is  higher,  more  subtle,  have,  even  in  the  choice  of  their  road, 
to  be  more  circumspect." 

To  speak  it  in  a  word;  the  cultivation  of  my  individual 
self,  here  as  I  am,  has  from  my  youth  upwards  been  con- 
stantly though  dimly  my  wish  and  my  purpose.  The  same 
intention  I  still  cherish,  but  the  means  of  realizing  it  are  now 
grown  somewhat  clearer.  I  have  seen  more  of  life  than  thou 
believest,  and  profited  more  by  it  also.    Give  some  attention 

•Ihid.,  Vol.  I.,  p.  400. 
•  Ibid.,  VoL  II.,  p.  6. 

•Wilhelm  Mebter's  " Wanderjahre, "  Edward  Bell.  Bell's  edition, 
1892,  p.  366. 


258  EDUCATION 

then  to  what  I  say,  though  it  should  not  altogether  tally  with 
thy  own  opinions. 

Had  I  been  a  nobleman,  our  dispute  would  soon  have  been 
decided;  but  being  a  simple  burgher,  I  must  take  a  path  of 
my  own;  I  know  not  how  it  is  in  foreign  countries;  but  in 
Germany,  a  universal,  and  if  I  may  say  so,  personal  cultiva- 
tion is  beyond  the  reach  of  any  one  except  a  nobleman.  A 
burgher  may  acquire  merit ;  by  excessive  efforts  he  may  even 
educate  his  mind ;  but  his  personal  qualities  are  lost,  or  worse 
than  lost,  let  him  struggle  as  he  will.  Since  the  nobleman, 
frequenting  the  society  of  the  most  polished,  is  compelled  to 
give  himself  a  polished  manner;  since  this  manner,  neither 
door  nor  gate  being  shut  against  him,  grows  at  last  an  uncon- 
strained one;  since,  in  court  or  camp,  his  figure,  his  person, 
are  a  part  of  his  possessions,  and  it  may  be  the  most  neces- 
sary part, — he  has  reason  enough  to  put  some  value  on  them, 
and  to  show  that  he  puts  some.  A  certain  stately  grace  in 
common  things,  a  sort  of  gay  elegance  in  earnest  and  im- 
portant ones,  becomes  him  well ;  for  it  shows  him  to  be  every- 
where in  equilibrium.  He  is  a  public  person,  and  the  more 
cultivated  his  movements,  the  more  sonorous  his  voice,  the 
more  staid  and  measured  his  whole  being  is,  the  more  per- 
fect is  he.  If  to  high  and  low,  to  friends  and  relations,  he 
continues  still  the  same,  then  nothing  can  be  said  against 
him,  none  may  wish  him  otherwise.  His  coldness  must  be 
reckoned  clearness  of  head,  his  dissimulation  prudence.  If 
he  can  rule  himself  externally  at  every  moment  of  his  life, 
no  man  has  aught  more  to  demand  of  him ;  and  whatever  else 
there  may  be  in  him  or  about  him,  capacities,  talents,  wealth, 
all  seem  gifts  of  supererogation.^ 

•Wilhelm  Meister's  "Lehrjahre,"  Thomas  Carlyle.  Centenary  edi- 
tion, Vol.  I.J  pp.  327,  328. 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  259 

But,  in  the  sum  and  substance  of  Goethe  *8  ex- 
periencing mind,  one  easily  finds  a  high  place  given 
to  what  are  called  the  classics.  Early  did  Goethe 
surrender  himself  to  the  ancient  masters.  He 
says: 

But  a  leading  conviction,  which  was  continually  revived 
within  me,  was  that  of  the  importance  of  the  ancient  tongues ; 
since  from  amidst  this  literary  hurly-burly,  thus  much  con- 
tinually forced  itself  upon  me,  that  in  them  were  preserved 
all  the  models  of  oratory,  and  at  the  same  time  everything 
else  of  worth  that  the  world  has  ever  possessed.  Hebrew, 
together  with  biblical  studies,  had  retired  into  the  back- 
ground, and  Greek  likewise,  since  my  acquaintance  with  it  did 
not  extend  beyond  the  New  Testament.  I  therefore  the  more 
zealously  kept  to  Latin,  the  master-pieces  in  which  lie  nearer 
to  us,  and  which,  besides  its  splendid  original  productions, 
offers  us  the  other  wealth  of  all  ages  in  translations,  and 
the  works  of  the  greatest  scholars.  I  consequently  read  much 
in  this  language,  with  great  ease,  and  was  bold  enough  to 
believe  I  understood  the  authors,  because  I  missed  nothing 
of  the  literal  sense.  Indeed  I  was  very  indignant  when  I 
heard  that  Grotius  had  insolently  declared  "he  did  not  read 
Terence  as  boys  do. ' '  Happy  narrow-mindedness  of  youth ! — 
nay,  of  men  in  general,  that  they  can,  at  every  moment  of 
their  existence,  fancy  themselves  finished,  and  inquire  after 
neither  the  true  nor  the  false,  after  neither  the  high  nor  the 
deep,  but  merely  after  that  which  is  suited  to  them. 

I  had  thus  learned  Latin,  like  German,  French  and  Eng- 
lish, merely  by  practice,  without  rules,  and  without  concep- 
tion.   Whoever  knows  the  condition  of  school  instruction  then, 


260  EDUCATION 

will  not  think  it  strange  that  I  skipped  grammar  as  well 
as  rhetoric;  all  seemed  to  me  to  come  together  naturally;  I 
retained  the  words,  their  forms  and  inflexions,  in  my  ear 
and  mind,  and  used  the  language  with  ease  in  writing  and 
in  chattering.' 

He  also  affirms  in  particular  that  the  great  forces 
of  civilization  are  found  in  the  Bible,  in  Plato  and 
in  Aristotle. 

In  the  history  of  the  development  of  knowledge  the  Bible, 
Aristotle,  and  Plato  have  been  the  dominant  factors;  and  to 
these  three  bases  we  must  always  return.  Neo-platonists,  they 
say;  well,  that  means  coming  back  to  Plato. 

Scholasticism,  and  that  Kant  is  bringing  back  scholasticism ; 
that  is,  Aristotle.    And  of  course  one  returns  to  the  Bible.* 

Yet,  while  emphasizing  the  value  of  the  ancient 
classics,  by  parity  of  earnestness  and  of  reasoning 
he  commends  the  modern  sciences. 

For  more  than  a  century  now  the  humanities  have  ceased 
to  influence  the  minds  of  those  who  pursue  them,  and  it  is 
fortunate  that  Nature  has  stepped  in,  drawn  the  interest 
to  herself,  and  opened  to  us  from  her  threshold  the  road  of 
humanity. 

That  the  humanities  do  not  shape  morals!  It  is  by  no 
means  necessary  that  everyone  study  the  humanities,  those 
knowledges — ^historical  antiquarian,  belletristic,  and  artistic 
— that  have  come  to  us  out  of  antiquity  and  belong  to  it — 

»"The  Autobiography  of  Goethe,"  etc.,  Vol.  I.,  p.  200. 

•*♦  Conversations,"  Weimar,  1808,  F.  V.  Biedermann,  Vol.  I.,  p.  520. 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  261 

are  by  this  time  so  diffused  that  they  need  no  longer  be  de- 
rived immediately  from  the  ancients,  unless  one  wished  to  put 
his  whole  life-time  upon  it.  Then  culture  of  this  sort  becomes 
again  one-sided,  which  has  no  advantage  over  any  other  one- 
sided culture,  indeed,  falls  below  it,  because  it  cannot  be  nor 
become  productive." 

What  a  world  of  treasures  lies  in  the  sciences,  how  ever 
increasingly  rich  one  finds  them  to  be!  IIow  much  that  is 
wiser,  greater,  nobler  than  we,  has  lived,  and  we  mortals 
imagine  that  we  alone  are  wise!  A  people  that  possesses 
a  morning  paper,  a  fashionable  journal,  a  free-lance  organ 
(Preimiitigen)  is  already  quite  lost.  IIow  much  better  is 
the  so-often  decried  reading  of  novels,  which  has  produced 
such  a  tremendously  broad,  even  if  not  sound,  culture.*" 

To  Goethe,  self-education  has  many  values. 
Self-discipline  may  be  very  real,  not  only  in  will, 
but  also  in  intellect.  His  beliefs  are  largely  a 
transcript  of  his  own  educational  experiences. 

Only  that  I  may  not  have  to  pursue  any  thing  as  a  voca- 
tion! I  will  do  all  that  I  can  playingly,  whatever  comes  to 
me  and  as  long  as  the  inclination  to  it  lasts.  So  I  played  un- 
consciously in  youth ;  and  so  I  will  continue  consciously 
through  the  rest  of  my  life.  Useful — use,  that  is  your  affair. 
You  want  to  use  me ;  but  I  cannot  adjust  myself  to  sale  and 
demand.  What  I  can  do  and  understand,  that  you  shall  use, 
as  soon  as  you  wish  and  have  need.  I  will  not  give  myself 
up  as  a  tool ;  and  every  profession  is  a  tool,  or,  if  you  wish 
it  expressed  more  elegantly,  an  organ." 

•Hid.,  Vol.  II.,  p.  6.  "76W.,  p.  10. 

»" Conversations,"  Weimar,  1807,  etc.,  Vol.  I.,  p.  472. 


262  EDUCATION 

It  is,  therefore,  an  education,  which,  in  modem 
phrase,  we  call  broad,  in  which  Goethe  believed.  It 
was  an  education  as  wide  as  humanity,  as  diverse 
as  the  qualities  of  the  human  mind,  as  high  and  as 
deep  as  human  achievements,  and  as  the  forces  out 
of  which  these  achievements  are  made.  The  classi- 
cist may  claim  him  as  a  disciple,  and  the  scientist 
may  also  declare  him  to  be  his  apostle.  The  culture 
which  he  embodied  and  promulgated  lay,  like  the 
kingdom  of  Heaven,  four  square.  Although  the 
mind  and  sentiments  of  Goethe  are  fundamentally 
unlike  those  of  John  Stuart  Mill,  yet  the  German 
and  the  Englishman  are  united  in  the  belief  that 
the  human  intellect  and  character  are  worthy  to  re- 
ceive, and  should  accept,  a  training  as  high  as 
divinity  can  inspire,  as  broad  as  life  can  embrace, 
and  as  deep  as  destiny  can  fathom. 

Yet  although  Goethe's  conception  of  education 
is  as  broad  as  man's  nature,  it  is  still  to  be  adjusted 
to  man's  specific  needs.  Goethe  affirms  and  argues 
that  education  is  to  be  devoted  to  special  ends. 
These  ends  are  often  of  a  character  which  proves 
that  they  arise  from  more  immediate  wants. 
Goethe  would  educate  man  for  his  place,  for  his 
times,  for  his  station  in  society,  and  for  the  fulfill- 
ing of  his  duty  to  his  family,  and  to  the  state. 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  263 

The  capabilities  that  lie  in  men  can  be  divided  into  gen- 
eral and  special ;  the  general  are  to  be  regarded  as  activi- 
ties in  a  state  of  balanced  repose,  which  are  aroused  by  cir- 
cumstances, and  directed  accidentally  to  this  or  that  end. 
Man's  faculty  of  imitation  is  general:  he  will  make  or  form 
in  imitation  of  what  he  sees,  even  without  the  slightest  inward 
and  outward  means  to  that  end.  It  is  always  natural,  there- 
fore, that  he  should  wish  to  do  what  he  sees  to  be  done :  the 
most  natural  thing,  however,  would  be  that  the  son  should 
embrace  the  occupation  of  his  father.  In  this  case  it  is  all 
in  one,  a  decided  activity  in  an  original  direction,  with  prob- 
ably an  inborn  faculty  for  a  special  end ;  then  a  resultant 
and  gradually  progressive  exercise  and  a  developed  talent, 
that  would  have  compelled  us  to  proceed  upon  the  beaten 
path,  even  if  other  impulses  are  developed  within  us,  and 
a  free  choice  might  have  led  us  to  an  occupation  for  which 
nature  has  given  us  neither  capacity  nor  perseverance.  On 
the  average,  therefore,  those  men  are  the  happiest  who  find 
an  opportunity  of  cultivating  an  inborn,  family  talent  in  the 
domestic  circle.  We  have  seen  painter-pedigrees  of  this  sort: 
amongst  them  there  have  been  feeble  talents,  it  is  true,  but  in 
the  meantime,  they  have  brought  to  light  something  useful, 
and  perhaps  better  than  they  would  have  achieved  with  mod- 
erate powers  in  any  other  department  of  their  own  choice." 

"Your  universal  culture,"  said  he,  "and  all  institutions 
for  that  end,  are  foolishness.  The  thing  is,  that  a  man  should 
understand  something  quite  definitely,  do  it  with  an  excel- 
lence which  scarce  anyone  else  in  the  immediate  neighbour- 
hood could  attain ;  and  in  our  association  particularly  this  is 
a  self-evident  matter.  You  are  just  of  an  age  when  a  man 
forms  any  plan  with  intelligence,  judges  what  lies  before  him 

"WUhelm  Meister's  "  Wanderjahre, "  etc.,  pp.  269-270. 


264  EDUCATION 

with  discernment,  grapples  with  it  from  the  right  side,  and 
directs  his  capacities  and  abilities  to  the  right  end. ' '  ^^ 

But  the  main  thing  will  be,  when  shall  we  find  ourselves 
at  the  place  and  spot  ?  ^* 

He  was,  for  a  time  at  least,  convinced  that  education  ought 
in  every  case  to  be  adapted  to  the  inclinations:  his  present 
views  of  it  I  know  not.  He  maintained  that  with  man  the 
first  and  last  consideration  was  activity,  and  that  we  could 
not  act  on  anything,  without  the  proper  gifts  for  it,  without 
an  instinct  impelling  us  to  it.  *  *  You  admit, ' '  he  used  to  say, 
"that  poets  must  be  born  such;  you  admit  this  with  regard 
to  all  professors  of  the  fine  arts ;  because  you  must  admit  it, 
because  those  workings  of  human  nature  cannot  very  plausi- 
bly be  aped.  But  if  we  consider  well,  we  shall  find  that  every 
capability,  however  slight,  is  born  with  us:  that  there  is  no 
vague  general  capability  in  men.  It  is  our  ambiguous  dissi- 
pating education  that  makes  men  uncertain:  it  awakens 
wishes,  when  it  should  be  animating  tendencies;  instead  of 
forwarding  our  real  capacities,  it  turns  our  efforts  towards 
objects  which  are  frequently  discordant  with  the  mind  that 
aims  at  them.  I  augur  better  of  a  child,  a  youth  who  is 
wandering  astray  on  a  path  of  his  own,  than  of  many  who 
are  walking  aright  upon  paths  which  are  not  theirs.  If  the 
former,  either  by  themselves,  or  by  the  guidance  of  others, 
ever  finds  the  right  path,  that  is  to  say,  the  path  which  suits 
their  nature,  they  will  never  leave  it ;  while  the  latter  are  in 
danger  every  moment  of  shaking  off  a  foreign  yoke,  and  aban- 
doning themselves  to   unrestricted   license."*' 

^Ibid.,  p.  282. 
"  Ibid.,  p.  383. 
"Wilhelm  Meister'a  "Lehrjahre,"  etc.,  Vol.  II.,  p.  100. 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  265 

In  this  education  which  is  at  once  broad  and  spe- 
cial, are  to  be  united  what  we  now  call  the  practical 
and  the  theoretical.  Tlie  deed  and  the  thought  are 
to  be  joined.  The  deed  without  the  thought  may 
be  illogical,  arbitrarj^  harmful,  disastrous.  The 
thought  without  the  deed,  is  vain  and  unavailing. 
Life  in  thought  and  for  action  was  his  ideal.  In  the 
Travels  is  this  double  activity  often  commended. 

Thinking  and  Doing,  Doing  and  Thinking,  from  all  time 
admitted,  from  all  time  practised,  but  not  discerned  by  every 
one.  Like  expiration  and  inhalation,  the  two  must  for  ever 
be  pulsating  backwards  and  forwards  in  life;  like  question 
and  answer,  the  one  cannot  exist  without  the  other.  Who- 
ever makes  for  himself  a  law — which  the  genius  of  human 
understanding  secretly  whispers  into  the  ear  of  every  new- 
born child — to  test  Doing  by  Thinking,  Thinking  by  Doing, 
he  cannot  go  astray;  and  if  he  does  go  astray,  he  will  soon 
find  himself  on  the  right  way  again.^" 

Many-sidedness  prepares,  in  point  of  fact,  only  the  ele- 
ment in  which  the  one-sided  man  can  work,  who  just  at  this 
time  has  room  enough  given  him.  Yes,  now  is  the  time  for 
the  one-sided ;  well  for  him  who  comprehends  it,  and  who 
works  for  himself  and  others  in  this  mind.  In  certain  things 
it  is  understood  thoroughly  and  at  once.  Practise  till  you  are 
an  able  violinist,  and  be  assured  that  the  director  will  have 
pleasure  in  assigning  you  a  place  in  the  orchestra.  Make 
an  instrument  of  yourself,  and  wait  and  see  what  sort  of  place 
humanity  will  kindly  grant  you  in  universal  life.  Let  us 
break  off.     Whoso  will  not  believe,  let  him  follow  his  own 

"Wilhelm  Meister's  "  Wanderjahre, "  etc.,  p.  264. 


266  EDUCATION 

path:  he  too  will  succeed  sometimes;  but  I  say  it  is  need- 
ful everywhere  to  serve  from  the  ranks  upwards.  To  limit 
oneself  to  a  handicraft  is  the  best.  For  the  narrowest  heads 
it  is  always  a  craft ;  for  the  better  ones  an  art ;  and  the  best, 
when  he  does  one  thing,  does  everything — or,  to  be  less  para- 
doxical, in  the  one  thing,  which  he  does  rightly,  he  beholds 
the  semblance  of  everything  that  is  rightly  done.^'' 

All  life,  all  activity,  all  art  must  be  preceded  by  handi- 
work, that  can  only  be  acquired  in  a  limited  sphere.  A 
correct  knowledge  and  practice  give  a  higher  culture  than 
half-knowledge  in  hundredfold.^* 

From  the  Useful,  through  the  True,  to  the  Beautiful.^* 

Regarding  Goethe's  relation  to  the  most  funda- 
mental element,  religion,  the  evidence  is  as  diverse 
as  it  is  in  respect  to  concerns  less  serious.  Contra- 
dictories abound.  He  sympathized  with  the  devout 
Moravians,  and  condemned  and  despised  priest  and 
priesthood.  At  once  he  commended  Voltaire  and 
had  a  large  heart  for  the  pietist.  There  is  reason 
for  calling  him  a  sceptic,  and  there  is  evidence  that 
he  was  a  believer  in  those  fundamental  concepts 
regarding  ultimate  being  and  destiny,  which  belong 
to  most  thoughtful  and  reverent  souls.  To  call  him 
a  pantheist  would  be  a  not  unjust  interpretation. 

But  whatever  his  personal  belief  may  have  been, 

"76id.,  pp.  32-33. 
«/&td.,  p.  146. 
^Ibid.,^.  61. 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  267 

it  is  clear  that  Goethe  does  believe  in  the  value  of 
religion  in  education. 

The  religion  which  rests  on  reverence  for  that  which  is 
above  us,  we  call  the  ethnical  one ;  it  is  the  religion  of  nations, 
and  the  first  happy  redemption  from  a  base  fear ;  all  so-called 
heathen  religions  are  of  this  kind,  let  them  have  what  names 
they  will.  The  second  religion,  which  is  founded  on  that 
reverence  which  we  have  for  what  is  like  ourselves,  we  call 
the  Philosophic;  for  the  philosopher,  who  places  himself  in 
the  middle,  must  draw  downward  to  himself  all  that  is 
higher,  and  upward  to  himself  all  that  is  lower,  and  only  in 
this  central  position  does  he  deserve  the  name  of  sage.  Now, 
whilst  he  penetrates  his  relations  to  his  fellows,  and  there- 
fore to  the  whole  of  humanity,  and  his  relations  to  all  other 
earthly  surroundings,  necessary  or  accidental,  in  the  cosmical 
sense  he  only  lives  in  the  truth.  But  we  must  now  speak  of 
the  third  religion,  based  on  reverence  for  that  which  is  below 
us;  we  call  it  the  Christian  one,  because  this  disposition  of 
mind  is  chiefly  revealed  in  it ;  it  is  the  last  one  which  human- 
ity could  and  was  bound  to  attain.  Yet  what  was  not  de- 
manded for  it?  not  merely  to  leave  earth  below,  and  claim  a 
higher  origin,  but  to  recognize  as  divine  even  humility  and 
poverty,  scorn  and  contempt,  shame  and  misery,  suffering 
and  death ;  nay,  to  revere  and  make  lovable  even  sin  and 
crime,  not  as  hindrances  but  as  furtherances  of  holiness!  Of 
this  there  are  indeed  found  traces  throughout  all  time ;  but  a 
track  is  not  a  goal,  and  this  having  once  been  reached,  hu- 
manity cannot  turn  backwards;  and  it  may  be  maintained, 
that  the  Christian  religion  .  .  .  having  once  been  divinely 
embodied,  cannot  again  be  dissolved.'^" 

"Ibid.,  pp.  155,  156. 


268  EDUCATION 

Two  obligations,  moreover,  we  have  most  strictly  taken 
upon  us :  to  hold  in  honour  every  form  of  the  worship  of  God ; 
for  they  are  all  more  or  less  comprised  in  the  Creed ;  secondly, 
to  allow  all  forms  of  government  equally  to  hold  good,  since 
they  all  demand  and  promote  a  systematic  activity — to  em- 
ploy ourselves  in  each,  wherever  and  however  long  it  may 
be,  according  to  its  will  and  pleasure.  In  conclusion,  we  hold 
it  a  duty  to  practise  good  morals,  without  pedantry  and 
stringency;  even  as  reverence  for  ourselves  demands,  which 
springs  from  the  three  reverences  which  we  profess ;  all  of  us 
having  the  good  fortune,  some  from  youth  up,  to  be  initiated 
in  this  higher  universal  wisdom.^'^ 

But  below  and  above  religion,  Goethe  holds  to 
the  value  of  that  composite  creation  and  creator 
which  we  denominate  character. 

Character,  that  is,  the  complex  of  the  primal  human  im- 
pulses, of  self-preservation,  self-respect,  etc.,  is  that  from 
which  the  forming  of  the  other  spiritual  powers  departs  and 
upon  which  also  it  rests.^^ 

All  education,  like  all  life,  is  to  be  conducted 
under  at  least  three  categories.  They  are  freedom, 
patience,  idealism. 

**0  needless  strictness  of  morality,"  exclaimed  he,  "while 
Nature  in  her  own  kindly  manner  trains  us  to  all  that  we 
require  to  be !  O  strange  demands  of  civil  society,  which  first 
perplexes  and  misleads  us,  then  asks  of  us  more  than  Nature 

«/6td.,  pp.  366-367. 

•"'Conversations,"  Weimar,  1806,  etc..  Vol.  L,  p.  470. 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  269 

herself!  Woe  to  every  sort  of  culture  which  destroys  the  most 
effectual  means  of  all  true  culture,  and  directs  us  to  the  end, 
instead  of  rendering  us  happy  on  the  way. ' ' " 

Persevere  in  direct  observance  of  the  day's  duty,  and 
thereby  test  the  purity  of  your  heart,  and  the  safety  of  your 
soul.  If  thus  in  unoccupied  hours  you  aspire,  and  find  op- 
portunity to  elevate  yourself,  you  will  so  gain  a  right  attitude 
towards  the  sublime,  to  which  we  must  in  every  way  rever- 
ently surrender  ourselves,  regard  every  occurrence  with  ven- 
eration, and  acknowledge  therein  a  higher  guidance.** 

Yes,  he  has  the  noble  searching  and  striving  for  the  Bet- 
ter, whereby  we  of  ourselves  produce  the  Good  which  we 
suppose  we  find.  How  often  have  I  blamed  thee,  not  in 
silence,  for  treating  this  or  that  person,  for  acting  in  this 
or  that  case,  otherwise  than  I  should  have  done!  and  yet 
in  general  the  issue  showed  that  thou  wert  right.  "When 
we  take  people,"  thou  wouldst  say,  "merely  as  they  are,  we 
make  them  worse;  when  we  treat  them  as  if  they  were  what 
they  should  be,  we  improve  them  as  far  as  they  can  be 
improved."" 

A  great  contemporary  of  Goethe,  and  an  out- 
standing educationist,  was  Rousseau.  It  is  easy 
to  draw  certain  parallels  and  certain  contrasts  be- 
tween the  two.  Goethe 's  works  are  a  revelation  of 
the  future,  those  of  the  sage  of  Geneva  a  creed  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  Goethe  is  not  the  son  of 
a  new  culture,  like  Rousseau,  but  its  creator.    In 

"Wilhelm  Meister's  "Lehrjahre,"  etc.,  Vol.  II.,  p.  82. 
**Wilhelm  Meister's  " Wander jahre, "  etc.,  p.  403. 
"Wilhelm  Meister's  "Lehrjahre,"  etc..  Vol.  II.,  p.  111. 


270  EDUCATION 

personality  especially  they  are  very  diverse.  In 
the  one  we  have  feminine  sensibility  in  perception 
and  feeling;  in  the  other  the  self-conscious  pre- 
cision of  a  self-sufficient  man.  In  the  one  are  found 
subjective,  in  the  other  objective,  thoughts.  Rous- 
seau, arrogant,  sets  himself  against  the  influence 
of  the  world  about  him;  Goethe,  scientifically 
trained,  uses  scientific  methods  and  the  greatest 
objectivity  in  his  examination  of  life.  In  the  one 
we  have  a  unique  and  mighty  striving  for  inde- 
pendence, the  yearning  for  freedom  from  every 
fetter;  in  the  other  a  real  respect  for  the  histori- 
cally established  regulations  and  institutions  of 
state  and  church.  Also  in  religion  are  they  oppo- 
sites.  To  the  theism  of  the  Frenchman  stands  op- 
posed the  pantheism  of  the  German.  But  in  the 
main  idea  of  education,  in  what  Rousseau  calls  the 
Return  to  Nature,  they  join  hands.  For  Goethe 
also,  nature  is  the  great  and  eternal  teacher,  which 
alone  gives  us  the  right  measuring  rule  for  man- 
kind. Both  see  the  pettiness  of  human  culture  and 
both  value  the  virtues  of  simplicity  and  truth. 
Social  conditions  are  condemned  by  Goethe  no 
less  than  by  Rousseau.  Both  learned  to  know  the 
conflict  of  nature  and  moral  law,  both  stand  for  the 
principle  of  the  renunciation  of  personality  at 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  271 

times,  and  both  fight  together  for  a  noble  exist- 
ence, with  a  worthy  culture  as  the  normal  condition 
of  all.  Both  hold  the  highest  view  of  mankind, 
each  seeks,  according  to  his  ability,  to  bring  man 
back  to  original  nature,  and  both  begin  with  the 
child.  So  one  becomes  the  defender  of  the  rights  of 
children,  according  as  the  other  reveals  them. 
Both  are  active  in  a  practical  way  as  educators,  and 
both  exchange  their  educational  ideas  with  women. 
Both  lack  the  historical  point  of  view.  In  Rous- 
seau's view  "Robinson  Crusoe"  comprises  the 
most  admirable  dissertation  on  the  natural  educa- 
tion, while  Goethe  turns  to  the  "Chronicle  of 
Tschudis''  for  a  picture  of  a  worthy  type  of  man. 
In  the  same  manner  each  tries  to  illustrate  in  a 
definite  individual  the  idea  of  education  in  which 
they  believe.  In  WiUielm  Meister,  as  in  Emil,  poet 
and  philosopher  dress  their  theories  in  the  colors 
of  life.  The  method  in  both  is  fresh  and  living. 
In  both  exists  the  danger  that  the  example  may  be 
taken  for  the  thing  itself  and  the  single  case  con- 
fused with  the  general  rule.  But  let  it  be  remem- 
bered that  while  Goethe  planned  to  write  a  philo- 
sophical compendium  for  teachers'  seminaries, 
Rousseau  declares  that  the  child  should  be  the  ob- 
ject of  the  teacher's  most  ardent  studies;  so  that, 


272  EDUCATION 

though  his  whole  method  must  be  interpreted  as 
phantastic  and  partially  false,  one  can  neverthe- 
less always  draw  useful  inferences  from  his  obser- 
vations.^® 

This  interpretation  of  the  educational  beliefs  of 
one  of  the  greatest  of  men  I  shall  close  with  a  gen- 
eral selection — ^which  might  be  vastly  enlarged — 
from  his  writings.  These  selections  do  represent 
certain  practical  axioms.  They  are  pregnant,  too, 
with  great  meanings. 

We  retain  of  our  studies,  in  the  end,  only  that  which  we 
apply  practically. 

There  is  in  our  universities,  a  pursuit  of  too  many  things, 
and  of  too  much  that  is  useless.  The  individual  teachers  teach 
their  subjects  too  extensively,  much  beyond  the  needs  of 
their  hearers.  Formerly  chemistry  and  botany  were  pre- 
sented as  belonging  to  pharmacology  and  they  gave  the 
medical  student  enough  to  do,  but  now  chemistry  and  botany 
have  become  distinct,  limitless  sciences,  each  of  which  makes 
claim  upon  a  whole  lifetime. 

He  who  is  wise,  will  reject  all  diverting  demands  on  him- 
self and  limit  himself  to  one  subject  and  become  proficient 
in  that. 

There  are  some  excellent  persons  who  can  do  nothing  off- 
hand, perfunctorily,  but  whose  natures  demand  that  in  every 
case  they  penetrate  in  quiet  to  deep  perception  of  the  subject 
in  hand.     Such  persons  often  make  us  impatient,  because 

*See  Adolph  Langguth's  "Goethe's  Padagogik,"  p.  312  ff. 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  273 

one  seldom  obtains  from  them  what  one  immediately  desires, 
and  yet  in  this  way,  the  highest  things  are  achieved. 

Character  does  not  take  the  place  of  knowledge,  but  sup- 
plies it. 

Children  are  the  best  preceptors  because  they  are  all  dis- 
posed to  lend  to  each  other  an  attentive  ear,  and  because  they 
speak  to  each  other  in  a  language  more  intelligible  than 
ours. 

Avoid  dividing  your  energies.  Hold  your  powers  together. 
Had  I  been  so  wise  thirty  years  ago  (December  3,  1824),  I 
should  have  done  far  different  things.  What  time  did  I  not 
waste !  I  cannot  think  back  without  vexation  to  those  under- 
takings in  which  the  world  misused  us,  and  which  were 
entirely  without  result  for  us. 

All  depends  on  your  building  up  a  capital  for  yourself 
which  will  never  give  out.  This  you  will  attain  in  the  studies 
you  have  begun  in  the  English  language  and  literature.  The 
old  languages  for  the  most  part,  you  nursed  in  youth,  there- 
fore seek  a  basis  in  the  literature  of  so  able  a  nation  as  the 
English.  Our  own  literature  is  in  the  largest  measure  to 
come  from  theirs.  Our  novels,  .  .  .  whence  do  we  have 
them,  if  not  from  Goldsmith,  Fielding  and  Shakespeare, 
and  even  to-day,  where  will  you  find  in  Germany  three  heroes 
in  literature  who  might  be  placed  beside  Byron,  Moore  and 
"Walter  Scott?  Therefore,  ground  yourself  firmly  in  Eng- 
lish. Hold  your  powers  together,  to  some  excelling  purpose, 
and  let  all  go  that  has  no  result  for  you  and  is  not  conform- 
able to  you. 

As  for  the  Greek,  Latin.  Italian  and  Spanish  languages,  it 
is  possible  for  us  to  read  the  finest  works  of  these  countries  in 
such  good  German  translations  that  we  have  no  grounds  ex- 
cept for  very  special  reasons  to  spend  much  time  on  the  labori- 


274  EDUCATION 

ous  learning  on  these  languages.  It  is  of  the  German  nature 
to  honor  everything  foreign  in  its  own  kind,  and  to  conform 
to  its  peculiarities.  It  is  not  to  be  denied  that  in  general 
one  can  do  a  great  deal  with  a  good  translation.  Frederick 
the  Great  knew  no  Latin,  but  he  read  his  Cicero  in  a  French 
translation  just  as  well  as  we  in  the  original. 

The  universal  development  of  human  powers  is  desirable 
and  most  excellent,  but  man  is  not  born  for  it.  Each  one 
must  form  himself  as  a  distinct  being,  yet  seek  to  attain  a 
conception  of  what  all,  together,  are. 

One  ought  to  beware  of  setting  the  frontiers  of  his  cultiva- 
tion too  far. 

Fix  upon  reality  and  seek  to  express  it.  That  is  what  the 
ancients  did. 

Even  though  the  world  as  a  whole  progresses,  youth  must 
always  begin  again  at  the  beginning,  and  live  through  the 
epochs  of  culture,  as  an  individual. 

Eevere  something  that  is  above  us,  for  in  revering  it,  we 
lift  ourselves  to  it,  and  manifest  through  our  recognition  of 
it,  that  we  bear  this  higher  thing  within  ourselves  and  are 
worthy  of  being  its  peers. 

I  have  every  respect  for  the  categorical  imperative.  I 
know  how  much  good  may  issue  from  it.  But,  we  must  not 
go  too  far  with  it,  or  this  idea  of  the  freedom  of  idea  will  lead 
to  no  good. 

National  literature  has  no  great  meaning  now  (1827).  The 
epoch  of  world  literature  has  come,  and  each  must  labor  to 
hasten  this  epoch.  .  .  .  We  must  not  think  it  is  Chinese  litera- 
ture, or  Servian,  or  Calderon,  or  the  Nibelungen,  or  rather  in 
our  need  of  some  exemplary  thing,  we  must  always  go  back 
again  to  the  ancient  Greeks,  in  whose  works  the  beauty  of  man 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  275 

is  represented.  All  else  we  most  regard  as  merely  historical, 
and  make  the  good  in  it,  so  far  as  may  be,  ours. 

The  truly  excellent  is  distinguished  by  this,  that  it  belongs 
to  all  mankind. 

It  remains  always  a  heart-lifting  sensation  to  win  from 
the  impenetrable  a  few  illumined  spaces. 

If  lithesome  youth  may  legitimately  form  a  wish,  it  were 
surely  this,  to  discern  in  every  performance,  what  is  praise- 
worthy, good,  fair,  aspiring,  in  a  word,  the  ideal,  and  even 
in  what  is  not  difficult,  to  discern  the  universal  type  and  ex- 
emplar of  man. 

Mathematicians  are  foolish  people,  and  so  far  from  pos- 
sessing even  a  notion  of  the  main  point,  that  one  has  to  be 
indulgent  to  their  conceit.  ...  I  have  become  more  and  more 
conscious  of  the  fact,  which  I  had  quietly  recc^nized  long  ago, 
that  the  training  given  to  the  mind  by  mathematicians  is 
extremely  one-sided  and  limited.  Voltaire  even  ventures  to 
say  somewhere:  "J'ai  toujours  remarque  que  la  Geometric 
laisse  I'esprit  ou  elle  le  trouve."  Franklin  also  has  a  peculiar 
aversion  to  mathematicians,  and  expresses  this  plainly  and 
clearly  in  reference  to  social  intercourse,  when  he  speaks  of 
their  spirit  of  littleness  and  contradiction,  as  being  in- 
tolerable. 

How  did  moral  feeling  come  into  the  world  ?  Through  God 
himself,  like  every  other  good. 

We  ought  to  study  not  our  contemporaries  and  fellow 
aspirants,  but  great  men  of  the  past,  whose  works  have  held 
for  centuries  an  equal  worth  and  an  equal  estimation.  A 
really  highly  gifted  person  will  in  any  case  feel  the  need 
of  this  within  himself,  and  just  this  need  of  communion  with 
great  predecessors  is  the  sign  of  a  higher  tendency. 

The  spirit  of  the  real  is  the  truly  ideal. 


276  EDUCATION 

I  am  sure  that  many  a  dialectically  sick  spirit,  might  find 
in  the  study  of  nature,  a  beneficent  feeling. 

It  were  well  to  think  in,  as  well  as  to  read  or  write,  a 
foreign  language. 

That  divine  illumination  whereby  the  extraordinary  comes 
to  be,  we  shall  always  find  in  league  with  youth  and  pro- 
ductivity. 

For  what  is  genius  other  than  that  productive  power 
whereby  deeds  arise  which  may  be  shown  before  God  and 
nature,  and  which  even  therefore  have  consequences  and  are 
permanent  ? 

It  is  not  enough  to  be  gifted;  it  takes  more  than  that  to 
be  sagacious;  one  must  be  in  great  relationships,  and  have 
a  chance  to  look  at  the  cards  of  the  playing  figures  of  the 
time,  and  himself  play  with  them  for  gain  and  loss. 

The  good  world  does  not  know  what  it  costs  in  time  and 
in  pains  to  learn  to  read  and  to  profit  from  one's  reading: 
I  have  put  into  it  eighty  years. 

The  more  one  has  deepened  his  own  study  of  any  subject 
whatever,  the  more  he  is  in  a  position  to  teach  well  its  ele- 
ments. 

The  secret  [with  persons]  lies  not  in  birth  or  wealth ;  but  it 
lies  in  this,  that  they  have  the  courage  to  be  what  nature  has 
made  them.  There  is  about  them  nothing  perverted  or  warped, 
there  are  in  them  no  incompleteness  and  obliquities ;  but,  how- 
ever they  are,  they  are  always  thoroughly  complete  beings. 

Goethe  illustrates,  in  both  his  character  and 
his  writings,  the  two  fundamental  elements  of 
education,  self-culture  and  comprehensiveness  of 
learning.    He  aimed  at  the  enlargement  and  en- 


ACCORDING  TO  GOETHE  277 

richment  of  his  own  being  and  also  at  the  posses- 
sion of  universal  knowledge.  Above  most  did  he 
succeed  in  gaining  these  ends.  In  his  moral  rela- 
tions his  culture  was  selfish,  but  in  the  intellectual 
elements  it  was  ministered  unto  by  the  sciences,  the 
literatures  and  the  philosophies  of  all  races  and  of 
both  worlds,  ancient  and  modem.  His  mind  was  a 
vast  reservoir  which  received  streams  of  influence 
from  many  sources,  and  which,  in  turn,  sent  forth 
streams  to  make  glad  the  heart  of  men.  His  mind 
was  as  a  great  lens  which  receives  the  light,  which 
seems  to  be  vitally  eager  for  more  light,  and  which 
sheds  forth  that  light  unto  measureless  distances. 
He  was  among  the  greatest  of  the  great. 

Education  indeed  is  designed  to  give  enlarge- 
ment and  enrichment  to  the  individual  and  to  the 
race.  It  recognizes  that  the  center  of  its  service  is 
personality,  but,  despite  the  natural  and  inevitable 
charge  of  selfishness,  it  also  seeks  to  know  all  that 
can  be  known.  Its  horizon  is  limited  only  by  its 
own  power  of  seeing.  Under  this  limitation,  how- 
ever, a  sense  of  over-yonderness  rules  and  inspires. 
The  infinite  touches  and  embraces  the  finite. 

Education,  therefore,  is  as  narrow  as  the  indi- 
vidual. Education  also  is  as  broad  as  nature,  as 
humanity  and  as  human  appreciation  of  divinity. 


278  EDUCATION 

In  one  relation  it  stands  pre-eminently  for  power 
and  in  the  other  for  sympathy.  Through  power 
and  sjrmpathy,  it  fulfills  apparently  the  supreme 
purposes  of  life  and  of  all  being. 


IX 

SUMMARY  AND  CX)NCLUSIONS 

THE  preceding  chapters  are  devoted  to  an 
interpretation  of  the  gospel  of  education  as 
set  forth  by  eight  human  and  humanistic  masters. 
Six  of  the  eight  belong  to  a  single  race  and  to  the 
Mid-Victorian  age.  By  the  influence  of  this  age, 
because  of  distance  in  both  space  and  time,  Goethe, 
the  last  of  the  eight,  was  untouched.  But  Emerson, 
the  first  of  the  number,  was  deeply  filled  by  its 
spirit.  The  period  in  which  these  men  lived  and 
wrought  was  a  time  of  rationalism.  It  was  be- 
lieved that  the  intellect  of  man  was  the  chief  tool 
for  carving  out  a  perfect  civilization.  Truth  was 
to  be  known.  It  was  to  be  translated  into  thought. 
Thought  was  to  be  confirmed  into  belief,  belief 
was  to  be  transmuted  into  action,  and  action  was 
to  be  solidified  into  character,  both  individual  and 
conununal.  "We  needs  must  love  the  highest  when 
we  see  it,"  sang  Tennyson. 

Each  of  these  masters,  including  Emerson  and 
Goethe,  sympathetic  with  and  eager  to  serve  his 

279 


280     SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS 

age,  interpreted  education  as  rational  in  its  nature, 
forces  and  conditions.  Education  was,  as  has  been 
made  evident  in  the  preceding  chapters,  at  least 
rational.  Education  was  also  something  other  and 
possibly  higher  than  rational.  But  to  them  each  it 
was  first  a  rational  process. 

For  to  Newman  even,  the  ecclesiastic,  the  theo- 
logian, education  had  to  do  with  reason,  to  Mill  it 
spelled  reasoning,  and  to  Emerson  it  meant  truth, 
both  as  a  creative  cause,  as  a  process  and  as  a  re- 
sult. Reason  gains  knowledge,  it  was  held,  by  im- 
mediate perception.  It  builds  up  its  own  world  out 
of  the  bricks  of  experience  and  of  observation.  In 
accordance  with  a  plan  which  has  been  impressed 
upon  it  from  the  beginning,  it  creates  principles,  it 
accumulates  facts,  it  accentuates  relations,  it  makes 
inferences,  it  points  out  duties.  It  analyzes,  syn- 
thesizes, draws  inductions  and  deductions,  philoso- 
phizes, even  geometrizes  as  says  Plato  of  the 
Divine  Being.  The  use  of  reason  may  be  either 
good  or  ill,  false  or  true,  logical  or  illogical,  but  it 
does  use  itself.  Truth  is  its  food,  truth  the  atmos- 
phere in  which  it  moves,  truth  the  ground  on  which 
it  stands.  Its  worthy  use  is  promoted  by  educa- 
tion, and  the  more  thorough  and  profound  the 
education,  the  more  complete  is  the  evidence  that 


SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS     281 

its  use  is  worthy.  The  place  given  to  the  reason  in 
the  education  of  these  mastera  was  the  extension 
and  the  elaboration  of  the  doctrine  of  John  Locke 
and  of  the  light-bearers  of  the  French  Revolution. 
Yet,  although  education  is  intellectual  and  ra- 
tional, it  is  still  more  essential  that  it  be  interpreted 
and  applied  as  moral.  In  an  age  rational,  the 
emphasis  is  put  on  a  side  of  education  other  than 
rational.  To  educate  the  feelings  is,  in  the  judg- 
ment of  Matthew  Arnold — a  school  master  and  the 
son  of  a  school  master — quite  as  important  as  the 
elevation  of  the  intellect,  and  the  lifting  of  both  is 
the  comprehensive  aim  and  work  of  the  whole  edu- 
cational service.  Character,  says  Goethe,  is  the 
sum  of  the  primal  human  impulses  of  self-pres- 
ervation and  of  self-respect ;  from  it  other  spiritual 
powers  take  their  origin,  and  on  it  they  rest.  The 
intellect  enriches  the  feelings,  the  feelings  quicken 
the  intellect,  and  both  move  on,  and  are  moved  by, 
the  will.  If  the  heart  without  the  intellect  be  blind 
and  quite  as  sure  to  work  destruction  as  edification, 
the  intellect  without  the  heart  is  dumb  and  dead. 
The  affections,  declares  the  virile  prophet  of 
Cheyne  Row,  have  the  supreme  place  in  teaching, 
and  sincerity  and  honesty  are  the  lasting  worths  of 
education.    John  Ruskin  confesses  that  one  of  the 


282     SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS 

great  lacks  in  his  own  education  was  the  lack  of  the 
element  of  love.  "The  intellect  sees  by  moral 
obedience,"  declares  Emerson.  *^Pure  intellect  is 
the  pure  devil  when  you  have  got  off  all  the  marks 
of  Mephistopheles. ' '  Real  moral  instruction  in  the 
public  schools,  says  Mill,  would  do  more  than  all 
else  in  attaining  the  highest  aims.  Indeed,  the  tes- 
timony of  Solomon  is  still  sound,  that  the  moral 
affections  and  appreciations  lead  to,  as  well  as 
arise  from,  intellectual  valuations,  and  that  the 
wisdom  of  the  heart  is  not  to  be  separated  from 
the  wisdom  of  the  mind. 

In  this  composite  interpretation  of  education, 
religion  assumes  as  many  types,  both  formal  and 
informal,  as  are  the  races  of  men.  But  of  any  type, 
whether  as  a  conscious  relation  to  the  divine  or  as 
simple  reverence,  it  takes  its  place  as  among  the 
most  potent  of  all  forces.  For  these  educationists, 
the  type  is  very  general.  It  is  devoid  of  creeds  and 
of  articles  of  specific  faith.  Its  altar  is  as  broad  as 
the  earth,  its  cathedral  as  wide-reaching  as  the 
sky,  its  incense  of  worship  nothing  less  than  the 
twilight  of  the  rising  or  setting  sun.  Reverence  is 
the  one  religious  virtue  and  grace  of  fundamental 
significance.  In  education  should  abide,  and  from 
education  should  come  forth,  an  infallible  religion. 


SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS      283 

a  religion  which  is  an  unconquerable  faith,  an  un- 
quenchable hope  and  an  abiding  charity.  To  Glad- 
stone religion  as  a  force  in  education  is  direct,  com- 
pact, forcible.  *  *  A  great  Christian, ' '  as  Lord  Salis- 
bury called  him  after  his  death,  he  holds  the  Chris- 
tian faith,  historically  and  dogmatically  inter- 
preted, to  be  an  essential  and  necessary  part  of 
university  education.  To  his  children  and  to  the 
nation,  he  declares  that  he  prefers  to  see  Oxford 
leveled  to  the  ground,  rather  than  see  loose  notions 
of  the  truth  and  of  the  inspiration  of  the  Bible 
prevail.  To  his  family  he  gives  direct  counsel 
respecting  nurture  in  religion  and  in  the  church. 
To  Newman,  likewise,  religion  represents  one  of 
the  most  formative  of  all  educative  forces.  The 
new  birth  of  the  heart  produces  a  new  birth  of  the 
intellect,  and  the  new  direction,  under  the  spiritual 
quickening  of  the  will,  adds  stimuli  to  both  intel- 
lect and  heart.  What  is  called  conversion  in  the 
Christian  church  has  a  value  to  some  personalities 
equivalent  to  that  of  a  liberal  education  as  weighed 
in  academic  scales.  As  an  exponent  and  force  in 
the  Christian  religion,  the  Bible  receives  emphatic 
commendation  from  Ruskin.  Again  and  again  in 
strongest  terms  he  acknowledges  the  debt  which  he 
owes  to  it.   The  English  of  its  King  James '  version, 


284     SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS 

as  well  as  the  exaltation  of  its  moral  precepts  and 
religious  truths,  cause  it  to  be  regarded  as  one  of 
the  most  potent  of  all  educative  instruments. 

Yet  the  question  recurs  again  and  again  in  these 
pages,  as  it  is  ever  recurring  in  life  itself,  how  can 
religion  be  taught?  Carlyle  specifically  considers 
the  question  and  is  content  with  passing  it  on  to 
those  ** whose  duty  it  is,"  he  declares,  **to  teach  re- 
ligion." *^  Those  entrusted  with  this  duty  will  find 
their  own  way,"  he  says.  Of  course  theology, 
which  is  theory,  can  be  taught,  but  religion,  which 
represents  life,  cannot  be  taught  any  more  than 
life  can  be  taught,  though  helps  for  understanding 
its  nature,  for  apprehending  its  truths,  for  appre- 
ciating its  relationships,  for  doing  its  duties,  may 
be  taught. 

It  is  also  not  a  little  significant  that  among 
our  masters  there  is  found  a  general  agreement 
in  the  belief  that  education  should  be  fitted  into 
the  character  and  influence  of  the  individual.  It 
should  be  made  personal.  The  peril  is  that  educa- 
tion will  be  a  mold  into  which  the  melted  metal  of 
common  humanity  will  be  flung  and  from  which 
the  people  shall  come  out  bearing  identical  forms 
and  a  similar  likeness.  Such  is  the  peril,  declares 
Mill,  existing  especially  in  public  education.    The 


SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS      285 

danger  is  less  menacing  in  education  based  more 
directly  on  the  voluntary  principle.  Differences  in 
nature  begin  with  birth  and  are  continued  and 
deepened  with  the  unfolding  and  development  of 
character.  These  differences  arc  to  be  respected. 
That  knowledge  which  is  most  worth  acquiring  and 
having,  tliat  training  which  is  most  worth  securing 
and  using,  is  to  be  sought  after.  Life  is  short.  The 
stores  to  be  accumulated  are  immense,  the  work  to 
be  done  is  hard  and  great.  Our  faculties  are  lim- 
ited and  the  results  which,  it  is  hoped,  they  may 
win  are  beyond  their  abilities.  The  college  student 
who  consoles  himself  with  Plato  would  in  trigo- 
nometry find  only  the  unrational  and  the  irritating. 
All  education  is  to  have  respect  unto  the  student. 
He  is  the  subject  to  be  educated,  not  the  victim 
waiting  for  the  pedagogic  altar.  Yet,  though  edu- 
cation is  ever  to  be  individualistic,  it  does  possess 
certain  great  common  underlying,  over-arching 
elements.  It  is  to  create  and  to  promote  lucidity, 
to  nourish  the  flexibility  of  the  mind,  to  give  free- 
dom from  prejudice,  to  foster  the  good  without  the 
evil  of  passion,  and  to  give  a  sense  of  humanity  in 
every  person.  At  what  point  in  the  process  indi- 
vidualism becomes  narrowness,  and  breadth  and 
liberality  vagueness,  is  the  critical  problem — a, 


286     SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS 

problem  ever  before  us,  ever  seeking  and  never 
finding  a  wholly  satisfactory  solution. 

This  educational  movement  in  the  individual  and 
the  community  is  carried  forward  by  certain  great 
tools  or  instruments  or  forces.  They  form  what 
are  called  the  studies  or  the  content  of  studies  or, 
in  awkward  term,  the  curriculum.  They  are  sup- 
posed to  represent  what  we  denominate  the  truth, 
and  truth  is  presumed  to  be,  not  only  the  mother  of 
freedom,  but  also  the  creator  of  personal  power. 
Diverse  are  the  credits  given  to  these  diverse  agen- 
cies. Carlyle  commends  the  study  of  history  as  the 
most  profitable,  being  the  one  "articulate  connec- 
tion" which  the  past  can  have  with  the  present.  It 
is  a  letter  of  instruction  given  by  the  older  genera- 
tions to  the  new.  It  is  good  and  profitable  to  know 
what  the  family  of  man  has  done.  But  for  those 
extremes  of  subjects,  the  sciences  and  logic,  he  has 
characteristic  contempt.  Toward  Latin  and  Greek, 
Carlyle 's  friend  and  correspondent,  Emerson,  has 
much  the  same  feeling  which  Carlyle  himself  has 
toward  chemistry  and  logic.  The  ancient  classics 
to  him  are  as  dead  and  as  dry  as  the  autumnal 
leaves.  The  antagonist  of  the  ancient  literatures 
as  a  part  of  the  education  of  the  American  youth 
finds  in  the  man  of  Concord  an  associate  as  virile 


SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS     287 

as  he  can  desire.  But  the  same  literatures  and 
languages  as  given  to  English  youth  do  discover 
in  Emerson  a  stout  defender.  For  these  studies 
offered  at  Eton,  at  Winchester  and  at  Oxford 
help  to  create  ** those  masters  of  the  world  who 
combine  the  highest  energy  in  affairs  with  su- 
preme culture."  For  the  same  great  subjects  and 
forces,  masters  as  diverse  as  Goethe  and  Glad- 
stone, as  Arnold  and  Newman,  cast  their  votes 
as  disciplines  and  as  forms  of  culture.  Though 
knowing  Latin  better  than  he  knew  Greek,  Goethe 
yet  held  that  Plato  and  Aristotle  with  the  Bible 
represent  the  greatest  forces  in  civilization.  To 
Gladstone,  the  tradition  which  they  represent  and 
embody  is  most  important  and  significant.  It  does 
hold,  with  the  Christian  religion,  European  prog- 
ress and  civilization.  To  be  a  part  of  this  civi- 
lization is  a  worthy  aim  and  stands  for  a  first- 
rate  achievement.  To  be  remote  from  it  is  to  be 
outside  the  pale  of  the  greatest  and  of  the  best.  To 
Newman  the  ancient  classics  are  a  form  of  gram- 
mar, the  knowledge  of  which  stands  for  the  most 
general  and  effective  of  all  disciplines.  To  Matthew 
Arnold  the  classics  give  to  us  an  ancient  world,  an 
acquaintance  with  which  aids  us  in  knowing  our- 
selves and  our  own  modern  world.    Greek  inspires 


288     SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS 

the  modern  man  with  an  appreciation  of  beauty, 
and  Latin  quickens  in  him  the  worth  of  character. 
Other  studies,  such  as  the  modem  languages, 
sciences,  metaphysics,  do  of  course  have  their 
place,  but  to  most  men  their  place  is  not  so  large  or 
so  alluring  as  that  belonging  to  what  some  are  still 
pleased  to  call  the  fundamental  linguistic  disci- 
plines. Whoever  wishes  to  get  the  most  adequate 
interpretation  of  such  studies  as  a  means  and 
method  of  education  does  not  fail  to  turn  to  and 
to  linger  long  among  the  pages  of  Mill's  St.  An- 
drews Address.  The  address  is  a  quarry  where- 
in the  mathematician  will  find  his  argument  for 
the  worth  of  mathematics  stated  with  the  utmost 
cogency,  where  the  classicist  will  find  his  plea  urged 
with  the  greatest  convincingness,  where  the  logi- 
cian will  meet  with  the  presentation  of  the  worth 
of  his  subject,  both  induction  and  deduction,  with 
an  eloquence  most  quickening,  where  the  attorney 
for  modern  practical  subjects  will  discover  reasons 
for  his  quest,  of  apt  value  and  of  fundamental  per- 
suasiveness. 

In  fact,  in  and  beyond  all  particular  studies,  it 
is  to  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  scholar's  functions 
are  at  once  broad,  deep,  high.  They  take  on  cubical 
relations.    They  are  conceived  with  the  categories 


SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS     289 

of  freedom,  patience  and  idealism.  They  are 
human,  as  well  as  humanistic.  Tliey  cover  all  life. 
They  are  touched  with  a  sense  of  the  infinities  and 
immensities  and  the  eternities.  They  stand  at  once 
for  inspiration  and  for  routine.  They  mean  in- 
spiration and  also  drill.  They  belong  to  the  still 
air  of  delightful  leisure  and  also  to  the  strain  of 
work  and  the  care  of  toil.  Without  haste  and 
without  rest,  the  scholar's  and  the  student's  service 
is  to  be  performed,  without  the  current  desire  of 
quick  returns  and  with  a  will  that  it  shall  be  as 
effective  in  securing  results  as  it  is  of  lasting  and 
surpassing  significance  for  hiunanity.  These  re- 
sults, the  results  of  the  scholar's  and  the  student's 
quest,  are  as  manifold  and  diverse  as  are  the  condi- 
tions of  humanity  and  as  are  the  forces  and  ele- 
ments of  material  nature.  The  scholar  is  to  be 
happy,  and  happiness,  with  Mill,  is  the  standard 
for  measuring  the  value  of  his  achievements.  Joy 
is  to  clothe  him  as  a  garment.  At  the  fountains 
of  rich  and  tender  consolations  he  drinks  when 
weary  and  depressed,  and  inspirations  and  quick- 
enings  are  his  as  he  plods  along  life 's  long  and  toil- 
some way.  Contentment  is  his  mood.  For,  if  he  is 
unable  to  make  the  numerator  of  life's  fraction 
large  by  his  positive  achievements,  he  can  secure 


290     SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS 

the  same  result  by  making  the  denominator  of  the 
same  fraction  of  his  desires  small.  He  has  vision 
and  should  not  lack  force,  though  his  reach  is  more 
than  his  grasp.  Like  Browning's  Grammarian,  he 
is  patient  of  time.  Though  he  is  eager  to  be  useful 
to  his  own  age,  he  knows  he  does  live  in  the  forever. 
Neither  is  courage  lacking  to  him  if  he  will  but  look 
from  his  lexicon  to  the  stars.  He  is  the  re-creator, 
adding  an  eighth  day  to  the  pristine  week.  From 
the  chaos  which  often  surrounds  him,  he  seeks  to 
bring  forth  a  cosmos.  If  in  his  service  he  seeks 
and  finds  a  livelihood,  he  does  not  allow  his  finding 
to  do  away  with  his  life.  If  he  knows  the  scholar's 
mood  is  one  of  solitude,  he  is  still  a  good  companion 
and  comrade  along  the  way.  If  he  is  faithful  to  his 
task,  a  worthy  servant  of  his  imperative  duty,  he 
remembers  that  to  be  is  more  important  than  to  do. 
If  he  is  self-respecting,  as  he  ought  to  be,  his  soul 
is  full  of  humility.  For  he  has  a  sense  of  relations, 
and  he  is  never  neglectful  of  either  graciousness  of 
character  nor  of  the  graces  of  conduct.  If  he  is  a 
learner,  he  is  also  a  teacher  and  he  bears  in  mind 
the  truth  that  the  teacher  is  more  to  the  student 
than  the  subject  he  professes  or  the  precepts  which 
he  conveys.  If  he  seeks  to  know  the  truth  thor- 
oughly, he  also  tries  to  convey  it — a  harder  task — 


SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS      291 

truthfully.  If  he  recognizes  the  august  categorical 
imperative  for  himself,  yet  he  is  merciful  to  the  re- 
bellious souls  to  whom  obedience  is  not  life's  first 
commandment.  He  has  clearness  of  thought  with- 
out coldness,  affection  without  softness,  strength 
without  harshness,  a  giant's  vigor  without  a  giant's 
cruelty,  a  sense  of  beauty  without  effusiveness,  in- 
dividuality without  eccentricity,  and  a  great  sym- 
pathy without  commonplaceness.  He  is  wise  with- 
out being  pedantic,  sincere  without  pride  or  van- 
ity, comprehensive  without  neglecting  the  detail, 
guided  and  inspired  by  high-reaching  and  deep- 
lying  principle  without  neglecting  the  nearest 
duty,  patient  without  sluggishness  or  slackness, 
considerate  in  both  feeling  and  mind,  magnanimous 
with  an  instinct  for  freedom  but  recognizing  the 
divine  and  human  laws,  never  allowing  courtesy  to 
hide  the  reality  of  things,  nor  the  reality  of  things 
underlying  to  be  a  substitute  for  courtesy.  Social 
and  yet  reverent,  controlling  self  and  therefore 
controlling  and  persuasive  of  others,  an  opportun- 
ist, yet  with  an  eye  and  an  ear  to  the  universal 
and  the  eternal,  tolerant  toward  others,  but  severe 
toward  himself,  having  a  life  and  character  filled 
with  life's  great  unities  and  yet  adjusting  himself 
to  daily  needs  and  hourly  duties,  inspired  by  life's 


292      SUMMARY  AND  CONCLUSIONS 

ideals,  yet  taking  hold  with  firm  grip  of  life's 
present  real  problems:  such  is  the  educated  man. 
Such,  too,  are  some  of  the  results  which  the  in- 
terpretation of  these  modem  prophets  gives  of  the 
worth  of  education  and  of  the  worth  of  the  edu- 
cator. 


THE  END 


INDEX 


Accuracy  in  education,  29ff., 
84flf.,  181. 

Aristotle,  reference  to,  185,  260. 

Arnold,  Matthew,  education  ac- 
cording to,  196-220. 

Art  and  scholarabip,  109ff. 

Bain,  quotation  from,  132. 
Barnard,   James   M.,   letter  to, 

176-177. 
Bible,  the,  in  education,  87,  98fiF., 

209. 
value  of,  260. 
Books,  value  of,  46ff.,  94iT. 
Brougham,   Lord,  reference   to, 

194. 
Browning,  reference  to,  290. 
Buffon,  reference  to,  253. 
Burke,  reference  to,  41,  72. 
Bume-Jones,  reference  to,  130. 
Butler,  Bishop,  reference  to,  182. 

Cabot,  J.  E.,  quotation  from,  3-4. 
Cambridge,    reference    to,    193, 

244. 
Carlvie,  education  according  to, 
38-73. 

intellect  according  to,  40ff. 

man  according  to,  39fiF. 
Character,  198. 

and  intellect,  23flf. 

interpretation  of,  23flf. 


Classics,  value  of,  22ff.,  166if., 
183flf.,  203ff.,  259. 

College,  value  of,  36ff. 

Contentment  a  result  of  edoea- 
tion,  81. 

Cramming,  216-217. 

Cultivation  a  result  of  educa- 
tion, 83-84. 

Culture,  199. 

Dartmouth  College,  reference  to, 
10. 

Darwin,  reference  to,  116. 

Desires,  education  to  be  ad- 
dressed to,  79. 

Discipline  in  education,  144ff. 

Drawing,  value  of,  in  education, 
118. 

Drill  and  inspiration,  27ff. 

Edinburgh,  University  of,  refer- 
ence to,  42,  194. 
Education  bill  of  1870,  reference 

to,  75. 
Education,  categories  of,  268. 
definition  of,  198,  256,  262. 
methods  in,  211. 
to  be  made  personal,  284fr. 
Emerson,    education    according 
to,  1-S7. 
personal  education  of,  2-4. 


293 


294 


INDEX 


English  people,  lack  of  interest 
of,  in  education,  75. 
youth  to  know  what  ?  93ff. 

Environment,  value  of,  in  educa- 
tion, 118. 

Esthetics,    value    of    study    of, 
160ff. 

Eton,  reference  to,  203-204. 

Examinations,  192-193,  216. 

Executive  work,  value  of,  165ff. 

Fawcett,  Henry,  quotation  from, 

156. 
Feelings,  place  of,  in  education, 

163. 
Fichte,  reference  to,  253. 
Fox,  W.  J.,  letter  to,  169. 
Frankfort,  reference  to,  252. 
Frederick  the  Great,  reference 

to,  52,  61,  64,  71. 
Freedom  in  education,  32. 

Gentleman,     interpretation     of, 

239ff. 
Germany,  reference  to,  206. 

schools  of,  reference  to,  218. 
Gibbon,  reference  to,  253. 
Gladstone,  education   according 
to,  179-195. 
Helen,  letter  to,  188-189. 
W.  H.,  letter  to,  181ff. 
Goethe,  education  according  to, 
251-278. 
reference  to,  44,  58ff. 
Greece,  literature  of,  158. 

Hallam,  A.  H.,  reference  to,  180. 
Hamilton,  reference  to,  159. 


Happiness,  standard  in  educa- 
tion, 171ff. 

Harrison,  Frederic,  reference 
to,  197. 

Harvard  College,  reference  to, 
2ff. 

Heredity,  value  of,  in  education, 
79ff. 

History,  value  of,  66fif. 

Horace,  reference  to,  205. 

Humboldt,  von,  William,  refer- 
ence to,  75. 

Huxley,  reference  to,  152. 

Imagination  in  education,  32ff. 
Inspiration  and  drill,  27fif. 
Intellect   according  to   Carlyle, 
40ff. 

and  character,  23ff. 

and  consolation,  33. 

and  freedom,  32. 

and  imagination,  32flf. 

discipline  of,  153. 

Johnson,  S.,  reference  to,  253. 

Kant,  reference  to,  253. 
Kingsley,  Charles,  reference  to, 
126. 

Lawrence,  Sir  Henry,  reference 

to,  74. 
Liberal    education,    nature    of, 

227£e.,  238. 
Literature,  English,  value  of,  in 

education,  117. 
Livelihood  and  education,  91. 
Locke,  reference  to,  281. 


INDEX 


295 


Logic  and  science,  66. 
in  education,  141ff. 
value  of,  115,  153ff. 

Mackintosh,  Sir  Jnmes,  refer- 
ence to,  214. 

Man  according  to  Carlyle,  39fT. 

Manchester,  reference  to,  192. 

Mathematics,  value  of  study  of, 
159. 

Mill,  James,  reference  to,  132. 

Mill,  John  Stuart,  education  ac- 
cording to,  131-178. 
personal  education  of,  135ff. 

Milton,  reference  to,  4. 

Morals  in  education,  102ff., 
168flf. 

Moravians,  reference  to,  266. 

Morley,  John,  quotation  from, 
133,  181-182,  222. 

Newman,    education    according 

to,  221-251. 
Norton,  C.  E.,  reference  to,  134. 

Occupation,  education  a  prepa- 
ration for,  82-83. 

Oxford,  reference  to,  70,  98, 180, 
193-194,  244. 

Peel,  Sir  Robert,  reference  to, 

180,  195. 
Pericles,  reference  to,  203. 
Philistinism,  definition  of,  200. 
Physiolofr\',  value   of  study  of, 

159. 
Plato,    reference    to,    155,    201, 

2G0,  280. 


Poetr>',  value  of,  161. 

Political     economy,     value     of 

study  of,  160. 
Power,  a  result  of  education,  85. 
Practical,     the,     in     education, 

105ff. 
Proportion  in  education,  201. 
Psychology,  value  of  study  of, 

159. 
Pusey,  quotation  from,  186-187. 

Reason,  nature  of,  223ff. 
Religion,   Goethe's   opinion    of, 

266ff. 
in  education,  18-19,  57ff.,  98ff., 

168ff.,  186flF.,  242ff. 
Rousseau,    reference     to,    253, 

269flf. 
Ruskin,  education  according  to, 

74-130. 
personal  education  of,  123ff. 
Ruskin    College,    reference    to, 

110. 

St.    Andrews    address,    Mill's, 

149flf. 
Salisbury,  Lord,  quotation  from, 

283. 
Scholar,  functions  of,  7-9. 
solitude  of,  28flF. 
subject  of,  and  force  in,  edu- 
cation, 9-11. 
to  have  resources,  13ff. 
Scholarship  and  art,  109flf. 
Science  and  logic,  66. 
value  of  study  of,  158ff.,  260. 
versus  classics,  19-21. 
worthlessness  of,  116. 


296 


INDEX 


Sincerity   the  result   of  educa- 
tion, 51ff. 

Social  education,  164ff.,  248. 

Solitude  the  duty  of  the  scholar, 
28ff. 

Solomon,  reference  to,  43,  282. 

Spencer,      Herbert,      quotation 
from,  131-132,  200. 

Sterling,    John,    reference    to, 
69-70. 

Student  educates  student,  17-18, 
68fif. 
personality  of,  15-16. 

Talk,  worth   and  worthlessness 

of,  48ff. 
Teacher,  methods  of,  65. 
training  of,  215. 
value  of  personality  of,  12ff., 

62ff. 
Teaching,  value  of,  62ff. 
Tennyson,  quotation  from,  279. 
Thinking,  value  of,  in  education, 

50, 148. 
Time  in  education,  30ff. 
Titian,  reference  to,  222. 
Turner,  reference  to,  129. 


TjT^es,   different,   in   education, 
150ff. 

United  States,  reference  to,  176, 

201-202. 
Universities,     a     collection     of 
books,  48. 
education  in,  234ff. 
worthlessness  of,  45ff. 

Vocation,  guidance  in  choice  of, 

107ff. 
Voltaire,  reference  to,  222,  266. 

Ward,  reference  to,  243. 
Webster,   Daniel,   reference   to, 

25. 
Wisdom,  nature  of,  41ff. 
Wolf,  rule  for  teaching,  211. 
Women,  education  of,  112ff. 
Wordsworth,  reference  to,  161. 
Work,  value  of,  54ff.,  190. 
Workingman,       education       of, 

llOff. 
World  educates  the  scholar,  11- 

12. 
Writing  in  education,  143ff. 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

Los  Angeles 

This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


DEC  15  1959 


-►*  f^  ?» i 


O^' 


Form  L9-32ot-8,'57(,C8680s4)444 


lA Thwing  - 


126  Education  according 
Tli2e  to  some  modern  mas- 


A  001  348  341  7 


ters 


ncn  ^5. 


jiCitL^- 


u 

126 
TU2e 


"X  •■'''* /-v. '' 


